Helicopter in which Piñera fell into Lake Ranco is re oated
The helicopter in which former Chilean president Sebastián Piñera suffered a fatal accident after falling into Lake Ranco, in southern Chile, was re%oated this Saturday afternoon from a depth of 28 meters by personnel from the Chilean Navy in collaboration with divers from a private company.
The extraction work began early in the morning and continued throughout the day. In addition to the Navy and private rescuers, the General Directorate of Civil Aeronautics (DGAC), the Prosecutor’s O#ce of the Los Ríos region and the Carabineros intervened at the scene.
According to the local press, the barge carrying the helicopter (covered with a kind of black blanket) will be taken to the port of Futronor, at the foot of the same lake, so that the aircraft can be delivered to the DGAC, in charge of transporting it to the commune of Cerrillos, in the Metropolitan region, where the capital is located.
For their part, Carabineros (Militarized Police) will be in charge of ensuring security during the transfer.
The helicopter that Piñera was piloting, a Robinson R44 registration CC-PHP, which he had owned since 2006, rushed over Lake Ranco, an exclusive resort more than 800 kilometers south of the capital where he spent summers with his family.
The three people who were traveling with him, his sister Magdalena, a friend and his son, managed to save themselves and, although the autopsy congrmed the death by drowning, The Prosecutor’s O#ce is still investigating why the ship fell into the water.
The latest expert reports released by the local press reveal that there were no calls from the aircraft to the DGAC, nor to the Lago Ranco Harbor Master’s O#ce and that since it was a small aircraft, It does not have a %ight recorder or ‘black box’, that could have provided information about the last seconds that the helicopter was in the air.
“Everything went very fast”
One of the companions of the former president on the fateful trip, Bautista Guerrero –son of his friend Ignacio, who was traveling as co-pilot–, explained in a brief interview given on Friday to a local media that “everything went very quickly.”
“Due to poor visibility, we turned around where we could see the coast better and there we ran into the water,” said Bautista Guerrero, 23, from the cemetery where the former president’s body was buried.
“The last thing I heard well is that (Piñera) would change course,” he added, before detailing that at the moment of falling into the water he opened the door, took off his seat belt and “when the helicopter Glled (with water),” he came out.
Piñera, who governed for two non-consecutive terms (2010-2014 and 2018-2022), is the second former president to die after the return to democracy in 1990 (the Grst was the Christian Democrat Patricio Aylwin, leader of the Chilean transition, in 2016) and was a controversial Ggure in the country.