Qualla: 2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash

2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Riatsnapper, CC BY-SA 3.0. It was just before midnight on 13 March 2017 when Rescue 116, a Sikorsky S-92 helicopter of the Irish Coast Guard, lifted off from Dublin and turned west. Two hundred and fifty kilometres out into the Atlantic, a fisherman had lost part of his thumb and needed evacuation to hospital. Rescue 118 from Sligo was going out to lift him. Rescue 116 was going to provide communications relay - a supporting role, on a route the crew had flown before. On board were Captain Dara Fitzpatrick, Chief Pilot Mark Duffy, winch operator Paul Ormsby, and winch man Ciaran Smith. None of them would come home.

Image: Riatsnapper | CC BY-SA 3.0

2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash: The Approach to Blacksod

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, CC BY-SA 3.0. Rescue 116 was scheduled to refuel at Blacksod Lighthouse on the Mullet Peninsula before continuing the mission. Approaching from the southeast in the early hours of 14 March, the helicopter was tracking a route at 200 feet above the sea - a low altitude, but one consistent with ...

Image: Nilfanion | CC BY-SA 3.0

2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash: Four Names

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Riatsnapper, CC BY-SA 3.0. Captain Dara Fitzpatrick was a senior pilot with years of search-and-rescue experience and a three-year-old son. Chief Pilot Mark Duffy was alongside her in the cockpit. In the back were winch operator Paul Ormsby and winch man Ciaran Smith, the two crew whose job was to go down ...

Image: Riatsnapper | CC BY-SA 3.0

2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash: The Search at Sea

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Riatsnapper, CC BY-SA 3.0. Captain Fitzpatrick was recovered from the sea in a critical condition and brought to Mayo University Hospital, where she was pronounced dead later that day. The search for the other three crew became one of the largest and longest the Irish state has ever mounted. The Commission...

Image: Riatsnapper | CC BY-SA 3.0

2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash: We're Gone

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Riatsnapper, CC BY-SA 3.0. The flight data recorder, when it was recovered from the seabed, contained the final cockpit communications. Among them was a phrase that became the title of the preliminary report's coverage in the Irish press: 'We're gone.' There were no mechanical anomalies. The aircraft was f...

Image: Riatsnapper | CC BY-SA 3.0

2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash: Twelve Contributory Factors

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Riatsnapper, CC BY-SA 3.0. The final report from the Air Accident Investigation Unit, published in November 2021 after four and a half years of inquiry, identified twelve contributory factors leading to the crash. The report was sharply critical of the management and organisational systems behind the searc...

Image: Riatsnapper | CC BY-SA 3.0

2017 Irish Coast Guard Rescue 116 crash: What Remains

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Riatsnapper, CC BY-SA 3.0. Captain Dara Fitzpatrick's funeral was held in Glencullen, County Dublin, on 18 March 2017, with a Coast Guard helicopter giving top cover over the church. Mark Duffy's funeral followed at the end of the month. For the families of Paul Ormsby and Ciaran Smith, who never recovered...

Image: Riatsnapper | CC BY-SA 3.0