ROME (AP) – Italian rescuers on Saturday located the bodies of seven people, including four Turkish and two Lebanese businessmen, who died when their helicopter crashed in a heavily forested, mountainous area in north-central Italy during a storm, authorities said.
Col. Alfonso Cipriano, who heads an air force rescue coordination unit that led the search since Thursday, said rescuers were tipped off to the crash site after a mountain runner reported seeing what he thought was a part of the mangled chopper during an excursion on Mount Cusna on Saturday morning.
Air crews confirmed the site and ground crews initially located five bodies, and then the other two, Cipriano told The Associated Press. The location was in a hard-to-reach valley and the chopper remains were hidden to air rescuers from the lush tree cover, but some branches were broken and burned, he said.
The helicopter disappeared from radar screens Thursday morning as it flew over the province of Modena in the Tuscan–Emilian Apennines. Electric storms had been reported in the area at the time, Cipriano said. The chopper was carrying seven people, including four Turkish citizens, two Lebanese and the Italian pilot, from Lucca to Treviso to visit a tissue paper production facility.
The two Lebanese were identified in Lebanon as Shadi Kreidi and Tarek Tayah, both executives at INDEVCO, an international manufacturing and industrial consultancy group. The two were said to be on a business trip.