Helicopter, remains of 4 men now on shore 5 days after oil rig crash

LIZANA, Miss. (WLOX/Gray News) - Five days after the helicopter crash that killed four in the Gulf of Mexico, family confirms the men and the helicopter are now back on shore at Port Fourchon. It’s not clear yet when the bodies will be released to the families.

Three oil rig workers and a pilot were on board when the Bell 407 helicopter crashed last Thursday morning as it was departing an oil platform.

The recovery comes after days of waiting and anguish for the family of one man on board, 36-year-old David Scarborough. His wife Lacy Scarborough said for days, she was getting nowhere with updates on the search for her husband’s body.

“In the beginning, they seemed very concerned about getting the men out, but now it’s just like I’m not really sure,” Lacy Scarborough said. “They have no answers. Everything is, ‘We don’t know. We’re doing grid work, but we don’t know. We haven’t picked anything up.’ I’m here, the other three guys’ families are all across Mississippi and one is in Louisiana and one is from another country, so it’s like we don’t have each other. We can’t come together because we’re all getting something different.”

David Scarborough, his wife Lacy, and their son Sawyer, who they lost to a drowning in March.(Scarborough Family)

Scarborough worked offshore for eight years, just completed a two-week shift and was on the way home to celebrate Christmas with his family. His wife is pregnant with another child after the couple lost their first to an accidental drowning in March. Scarborough was also the nephew of a WLOX staff member.

David Scarborough, 36, from Lizana is confirmed to be a passenger on the helicopter that... — David Scarborough, 36, from Lizana is confirmed to be a passenger on the helicopter that crashed off the shore of Louisiana Thursday.(Scarborough Family)

Tim Graham, of Quitman, Mississippi, was another passenger on board, the Clarke County Tribune reported Thursday evening.

According to Officer Jose Hernandez, with the U.S. Coast Guard, Rotorcraft Leasing Company owns the helicopter. The company still has not released the name of the passengers or the pilot, nor released a statement regarding the crash.

This crash wasn’t the Louisiana-based aircraft company’s first; it was the third of 2022. The most recent crash was only two weeks prior on Dec. 15, 2022 when a Rotorcraft helicopter went down near Terrebonne Bay, Louisiana, leaving three passengers stranded. Those passengers were eventually rescued by the U.S. Coast Guard.

The first crash of the year was on Jan. 14, 2022 when a Rotorcraft helicopter crashed into the marsh near Lafourche Parish, killing a pilot and a passenger.

The National Transportation Safety Board confirmed Thursday the agency is investigating the latest crash.

A search of the NTSB database shows 12 other Rotorcraft crashes occurred since 2004, resulting in 10 fatalities.

NTSB has not yet released reports for any of the company’s three 2022 crashes. The NTSB website says it tries to complete an investigation within 12 to 24 months, but it can depend on factors like the complexity of the investigation and the workload of the agency’s investigators.