Incident Name: Chicken Complex Fire
Date: 9/23/94
Personnel: John C. King
Age:
Agency/Organization: US Army supporting the US Forest Service
Position: Military Flight Engineer
Summary: On September 23, John King, a civilian serving as a flight engineer for a US Army Reserve CH-47D helicopter, died of traumatic injuries when he was struck by a helicopter rotor blade during a crash. The Boeing Vertol Chinook helicopter belonged to the US Army and was working to support firefighting activities on the Chicken Complex on the Payette National Forest near McCall, Idaho. King’s unit had been assigned to provide emergency support to the United States Forest Service for wildland fire suppression.
Maps
Chicken Complex Helispot
{mosmap lat=’45.059217’|lon=’-115.626562’|marker=’0’|text=’Davis Ranch Helispot’}
Reports, Documentation, Lessons Learned
- Forest Service Investigations – Fatal Aviation Accident History (1979-2000): Pages 72 & 73 for this incident (312 K pdf) | Entire History (download 4.72 MB pdf)
- Flight Safety Foundation (flightsafety.org): Flight Safety Digest, Vol 25, No. 6, Nov-Dec 1999, Rotor Wing Accidents 1974-1998 (102 K pdf)
- USFA Memorial Database: John C. King and on the National Fallen Firefighters Memorial under Washington
- John King’s name and death date are included in the USFA Firefighter Fatality Retrospective Study, published April 2002 (2,888 K pdf)
Wildlandfire.com Links:
Media Articles and Reports.
Photos, Videos, & Tributes
Forest Service Fire Management Today, Vol 55, No. 1, 1995 “In Memoriam”
Contributors to this article: Mellie
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