Five sailors dead after copter crash

Five sailors were declared dead Saturday after a U.S.

Navy helicopter crashed off the coast near San Diego on Tuesday, military officials said.

The Navy said rescuers searched for the sailors for more than 72 hours. The sailors had been missing since the helicopter, an MH-60S, crashed into the sea at 4:30 p.m. local time, the Navy said in a statement. The identities of the sailors were being withheld pending family notifications, officials said.

The Navy said it was trying to recover their bodies.

The sailors had been conducting “routine flight operations” about 60 nautical miles off the coast in the helicopter, which was operating on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, before the helicopter crashed.