FAA changes preliminary cause of BRPD chopper crash

BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) - Federal investigators have changed their preliminary cause of the Baton Rouge Police Department helicopter crash.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) initially said investigators believed the “aircraft tail rotor struck a tree and crashed inverted in a field.”

The FAA has now revised that report to say the aircraft “crashed under unknown circumstances.”

The helicopter crashed near Port Allen, LA around 3 a.m. Sunday, March 26 but the wreckage was not discovered until many hours later.

Both Baton Rouge Police Department pilots on board, Cpl. Scotty Canezaro and Sgt. David Poirrier, 47, were killed.

The two pilots had just finished assisting with a vehicle pursuit and were flying back to Baton Rouge when the crash happened.

The wreckage has since been removed from the crash site and taken to an undisclosed location so that federal investigators can continue their probe into the cause. That process is expected to take “two to three weeks,” investigators said.

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