Badrinath helicopter crash: All six onboard dead in Chamoli, Trans Bharat Aviation fleet grounded

PTC Web Desk:  Six persons, including five passengers and the pilot, were killed on Friday afternoon when a helicopter flying from Badrinath crashed in Uttarakhand’s Chamoli district, officials said.

The aircraft belonged to a private operator, Trans Bharat Aviation. It lost communication over the Joshimath valley, and its tracking system also stopped sending signals. A crash was reported at around 2.20 pm, after which a search and rescue operation began.

The pilot has been identified as Himanshu  from Delhi. The five passengers were Prathapa, Arun, Shankar Gowda, Sudheer K and HS Natraja, all from Karnataka. Arun is an inspector with the Bengaluru Police Crime Branch. Further details about the other passengers have not been released yet.

Two more helicopters were sent to locate the wreckage. Teams from the Indian Army, the Chamoli district administration and the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) were rushed to the suspected crash site. According to Police Sub-Inspector Manohar Kanyal, UCADA officials said the helicopter was found near the Army Camp above Chayi village.

Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said in a post on X that he had learnt of the crash near Chayi village in the Joshimath area. He said the district administration, the Disaster Management Department and the SDRF were jointly running the rescue operation. He also directed officials to airlift any seriously injured people to bigger medical centres.

A statement from the Chief Minister’s Office said Dhami and Disaster Management Minister Madan Kaushik took immediate note of the incident. They told the Disaster Management Secretary to start relief and rescue work without delay, and all related government departments were put into action.

Officials have not established what caused the crash. The region has seen heavy rain and cloud cover, with snowfall in some places. However, Prateek Jain, CEO of the Uttarakhand Civil Aviation Development Authority (UCADA), said the helicopter was cleared to fly only after weather conditions were found to be favourable.

As a precaution, the entire fleet of Trans Bharat Aviation has been grounded.

The crash follows two emergency landings of Char Dham helicopters in Uttarakhand earlier in October. One helicopter landed in Rudraprayag because of bad weather, while another was forced down in Tehri because of a technical problem.