By AMY GEIER EDGAR The Associated Press
FLORENCE - An Army helicopter that vanished during a training flight in bad weather was found Tuesday night on a river bank, and divers began searching for three soldiers who were aboard, Army officials said.
The UH-60 Blackhawk was found at 7:55 p.m. near a bridge off Interstate 95 in Dillon, said Maj. Rich Patterson, a Fort Bragg spokesman at the command post here. The helicopter was reported missing about 9:50 p.m. Monday during a flight from Fort Bragg, N.C., to Florence.
The discovery of the wreckage along the Great Pee Dee River changed the search ''from a search and rescue operation to a search and recovery operation,'' Patterson said. ''There are no visible signs of survivors reported at the scene.''
The state Highway Patrol closed off the northbound lane of the interstate while divers searched for bodies.
The names of the soldiers are being withheld pending notification of the family.
The helicopter was spotted by a truck driver on his way home along I-95 who heard about the missing aircraft through media reports and joined the search. On his third pass through the area, the driver noticed tree damage and what looked like a wheel near the river bank and called authorities, said Dusty Owens, director of the Florence County Emergency Management.
''We certainly appreciate his efforts as well as everyone else,'' Owens said.
Heavy foliage in the swampy area just north of Florence and near the North Carolina state line made it difficult to see the helicopter, Owens said.
Rain and thunderstorms moved across South Carolina on Monday evening, but Army officials said the weather should not have been a factor in the helicopter's disappearance. The Army is investigating the cause of the accident.
A second helicopter on the night vision goggles training mission landed in an airfield in Dillon when it lost contact with the missing Blackhawk, Patterson said.
Patterson didn't know if weather was a factor in that decision. ''I am not going to speculate on their reasons,'' he said.
That helicopter has returned to Fort Bragg and its crew interviewed, but Patterson would not say what came out of those interviews.
The search operation covered more than 120 square miles in five counties Tuesday and included the Civil Air Patrol, helicopter crews and soldiers on the ground from Fort Bragg, Florence County officials, emergency medical and fire services, state Natural Resources Department officers.
Tuesday afternoon, Fort Bragg sent down a second set of four helicopters - Apaches with night vision and forward-looking infrared radar systems that can spot a human being by detecting differences in temperature. Those choppers were to relieve the first set of four that had arrived at daybreak and to take the search into the night.
The ground search had been called off at dark and was to resume Wednesday at dawn.
Owens said boats searched the surface of the water and banks. At its deepest point, the river is 30 feet deep, he said.
On the ground, sheriff's deputies took teams out on about 1,200 acres of land owned by two hunting clubs.
The searchers, who were mostly members of volunteer fire departments, drove all-terrain vehicles down dirt roads and through the woods. They tied pieces of yellow police tape on tree branches after they had searched one of the many dirt paths that crisscross the property.
Wayne Bellflowers, a deputy with the Florence County Sheriff's Office, was on a ground search Tuesday afternoon. He had started about 1 a.m. looking for the Blackhawk and was still going at 3 p.m. ''You've got to have faith,'' he said. ''Never leave a man out there. You just have to go until you find something.''
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