A helicopter crashed into the roof of a hotel in Queensland, Australia, on Monday and exploded, killing the pilot. The incident occurred at about 1:50 a.m. (local time) at the DoubleTree by Hilton hotel in northern Queensland, Cairns. Hundreds of hotel guests were evacuated after the crash, which sparked a fire on the roof.
According to the BBC, Queensland Police confirmed that the helicopter’s sole occupant, the pilot, died at the scene. The charter company reportedly said the pilot was on an “unauthorized” flight. The Cairns Esplanade, where the hotel is located, is a no-fly zone, Australian Broadcasting Corporation News reported.
Hotel in Cairns, Queensland, Australia, evacuated after helicopter crashed into its roof#break #Cairns #Queensland #Australia pic.twitter.com/A1H3GDni9j
— Bobby Ellison (@BobbyEllisonKY) 11 August 2024
A hotel guest, Amanda Kay, recalled the helicopter flying “extremely low” without lights in rainy weather. She said the plane flipped over and hit the hotel, adding that it “exploded.”
Two of the helicopter’s rotor blades came loose on impact. While one landed in the hotel’s pool, the other was found on the promenade, the Queensland Ambulance Service (QAS) said, according to the BBC.
Caitlin Dennings, QAS’s senior operations manager for the Far Northern region, told media the crash sounded like a bomb and many hotel guests were “unsettled by the situation” after seeing the smoke and fire.
The building was evacuated as a precaution, but no one was injured. Two hotel guests, a man in his 80s and a woman in her 70s, were taken to hospital in stable condition, the state’s emergency services said.
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau announced it would send investigators to the scene of the accident. Charter company Nautilus Aviation promised to work closely with all authorities in Queensland to investigate the “unauthorized use of one of our helicopters in the early hours of this morning,” ABC News reported.
Following the accident, the streets around the hotel were cordoned off and police declared a state of emergency, the BBC reported.
The tourist city of Cairns is considered the gateway to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.
