New Zealand helicopter accident kills four tourists

Four British tourists were killed after a helicopter crashed into New Zealand's Fox glacier due to bad weather conditions

Four British tourists were killed when the helicopter belonging to Alpine Adventures crashed on Saturday into into a New Zealand glacier on the West Coast of the south Island due to “terrible” weather conditions: Andrew Virco, 50, Katharine Walker, 51, from Cambridge, and Nigel Charlton, 66, and his wife Cynthia, 70, from Hampshire died on the tragedy spot.

Mitch Gameren, the experienced pilot from Queenstown with more than 3,000 hours in the cockpit, was flying the helicopter, as weather conditions were very bad, with heavily overcast and raining.

Debris from the crashed helicopter was found over several hundred meters in the crevasses of the glacier. Unfortunately, the paramedics and the alpine rescue team confirmed there were no survivors.

Inspector John Canning declared:

"We have been to the site and there is no sign of life and tomorrow we hope to recover the bodies of those involved.

"I'm not going to risk any more lives, we've lost seven.

“It’s the top of the glacier and it’s heavily crevassed, very rough country and it’s going to take a lot of care to get the people out of there. It's quite dangerous.”

New Zealand Police spokesman added:

"Police believe the passengers in today's helicopter crash on Fox Glacier were six foreign tourists.

"It is believed two were Australians and four were from the United Kingdom. Formal identification of those people will take some time.

"Police have been liaising with the embassies of the countries concerned to ensure the next of kin are advised of the situation."

Similarly, nine people died in 2010 when a plane crashed on take off at Fox Glacier airport. New Zealand's poor safety standards have been massively criticized during the years. The country's Prime Minister John Key was urged to improve safety measures regarding travel industry, as the 8 miles long Fox Glacier is considered to be one of the most accessible glaciers in the world, that attracts thousands of foreign tourists every year.