Helicopter Was Involved In Haiti Relief Efforts

Two Americans who were assisting in relief efforts in Haiti were killed Thursday when the helicopter they were flying impacted the side of a mountain in the Dominican Republic.

Pilot John Ward of Fort Myers, Florida, and 53-year-old Naples. Florida  businessman James Jalovec, had filed  a flight plan from Santiago to Jimani in the Dominican Republic, then on to Port-au-Prince in Haiti and returning to Santiago.  They were on the return leg of the flight when the accident occurred.

Rosani Zapata, a spokeswoman for the Dominican Civil Aviation Institute, told CNN that the helicopter impacted a mountainside about 1900 in Dajabon, just east of Haitian border.

The helicopter, a Robinson R44, was reportedly only two weeks old. Ward was an experienced pilot who often flew Jalovec among his various business interests around the state of Florida. Jalovec who owned Sweetwater Environmental Inc., a sewage company based in Sebring, FL.

Jalovecs' son Mark said his father had begun talking about trying to help in Haiti about two weeks after the earthquake struck last month. " 'I got a helicopter; these people are in desperate need' -- he kind of decided it with Mr. Ward that they were going to do it, and that's what they did," Mark Jalovec said

The cause of the crash is under investigation.

FMI: http://dominicanrepublic.com/index.php