Chopper Collision @ Ft. Lews, WA - 4 Dead

[ABM]

Just heard that. I didn't get any other details.

 

[BrianFromWA]

it was a collision on a training flight. No passengers other than the pilots and co-pilots onboard.

 

[MARIS61]

If god had meant man to fly he'd never have created the TSA.

 

[BLAZER PROPHET]

If god had meant man to fly he'd never have created the TSA.

Gotta love someone making fun of four people dying like this and most likely leaving wives and children behind.

Nice job Mixim, errrrr, Maris.

 

[BrianFromWA]

Here are brief biographies of the four Army aviators killed Monday night in the crash of two helicopters at Joint Base Lewis-McChord:

Chief Warrant Officer 3 Frank A. Buoniconti III, 36, was a father of four and a native of Colorado, where he graduated from Doherty High School in Colorado Springs.

"He was a good husband and a good father, and is going to be missed dearly," said his father, Frank Buoniconti Jr., also of Colorado Springs. "We are grieving as well for the other three families that are suffering."

Buoniconti said his son was the type of guy who would look after other soldiers who might be alone on the holidays, and make sure they were invited to his house and treated well. "He would not only do that on the holidays. He would do that year-round."

Buoniconti's mother, Silvia Buoniconti, told The Colorado Springs Gazette that her son was "a great guy." He joined the Army because "he felt it was the right thing to do," she said.

Buoniconti married his high school sweetheart. The couple had recently adopted a special-needs child.

"Nobody wanted that little boy because of what he had and they didn't want him to get into the system," Silvia Buoniconti told The Gazette. "It just got final a week or two ago."

Buoniconti had served on active duty since July 1994, and had been stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord since early November 2011. His previous assignments were at Fort Bragg, N.C., and the National Training Center, Fort Irwin, Calif.

He had been deployed — two times each — to Iraq and Afghanistan.

He had been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, Meritorious Service Medal, Air Medal (six awards), Army Commendation Medal (nine awards), and the Army Commendation Medal with "V" device and the Army Senior Aviator Badge.

Capt. Anne M. Montgomery, 25, lived in one impoverished nation after the next, while growing up as the eldest child to a humanitarian-worker father. But to the tight-knit family, rural North Dakota was considered home.

Montgomery was the eldest child of Kurt and Kathleen Rockeman. Relatives say she was "bubbly" and "fun," and worked doggedly to get what she wanted.

After years of home schooling and time in private schools overseas while her father worked for U.S. Agency for International Development, Montgomery received an appointment to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

"To get an appointment to West Point was just out of this world. Her granddad, my dad, was a World War II veteran and was so proud of his service he was just floating on air when she got that appointment," said her uncle Keith Rockeman, of Grassy Butte, N.D. "She always had this dream of flying. My brother was a pilot, he was in the civil air patrol here in North Dakota. She inherited that love of flying from him."

In an essay that was submitted with her application to the academy, Montgomery wrote:

"I want to attend a school that challenges you physically and academically, regardless of gender, so I may fully gauge my abilities and shortcomings for myself. I want to be tested and come through still strong, to know that I am capable of accomplishing difficult things, and to have confidence in my ability to contribute."

After graduating from the academy in 2008, she began active duty.

It was while on active duty that Montgomery married Chief Warrant Officer Aaron H. Montgomery. The couple, both Kiowa helicopter pilots stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, were married in Georgia in May 2010, said her father-in-law, Levi Montgomery.

Levi Montgomery, who fondly referred to his daughter-in-law by the nickname "Rockie," said that "she was the perfect other half of my son."

"She was what made him whole, in a way that so few people can truly enrich and be enriched by others," Levi Montgomery wrote in an email to The Times.

Family was central to Montgomery, and she adored her younger sister, Geneva, who is a college student in Missouri. She was also close with younger brothers August and Christian, who live with their parents in Kenya, where the couple are on a mission with their church, said Rockeman, her uncle.

Montgomery and her husband spent Thanksgiving with Geneva and 11 other relatives, including Rockeman, at an aunt's home in Minnesota.

"We would get up and sit at the kitchen table in the morning drinking coffee, she would come down and we would just chatter and talk," Rockeman said. "What a wonderful couple. They were so devoted to each other and so fun."

During the four days in Minnesota, Montgomery told her relatives that she loved being in the military and adored flying, but wanted to have children.

"She loved flying, she just loved it," Rockeman said. "She mentioned one time she was afraid of heights and we thought, being a pilot, that's a weird idea. But she said that its great when you're in control. She was in control of what she was doing."

Montgomery's Army decorations include the National Defense Service Medal, Global War on Terrorism Service Medal and the Army Aviator Badge.

Chief Warrant Officer 2 Lucas Daniel Sigfrid, 32, has been on active duty since May 2008, and arrived for duty at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in January.

Although Chief Warrant Officer Sigfrid's personnel records list Alabama as his home state, he went to high school and college in Minnesota, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported Wednesday. He graduated from Champlin Park High School, in a suburb of Minneapolis, and attended St. Cloud State University for pilot training for joining the Army, said his cousin Mark Duclos.

The pilot's wife and Duclos' wife are both pregnant, Duclos told the newspaper.

"We were just talking last week ... about if we're going to have boys and they would grow up like us. We were just hellions," Duclos said.

Sigfrid's former high-school wrestling coach, Bill Maresh, said he wrestled all four years of high school and wasn't a champion but was a good guy who was dedicated to the sport and his team.

While other wrestlers might quit after two years if they're not successful, Maresh said Sigfrid stuck with the program.

"He was just one of those guys who kept coming, and he fought as hard as he could all the time," Maresh told The Associated Press.

A former neighbor, Mary Beall, of Bellwood, Ala., said Sigfrid and his wife Hilary were a "lovely young couple who were anxious to have their first child."

"They were very nice and very professional though private," she said. "It's such a shame to hear what happened."

Beall said Hilary Sigfrid was an emergency-room nurse. She recalled Sigfrid was gone from the home a lot due to the rigorous training he was undergoing.

Sigfrid's decorations awards include the National Defense Service Medal, the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal and the Army Aviator Badge.

Chief Warrant Officer 3 Joseph S. Satterfield, 32, was a native of Alaska, according to the Army.

Satterfield had served on active duty since September 1997, and had been stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord since December 2009. His previous assignments have been in Korea and at Fort Campbell, Ky.

He deployed to Iraq once, and to Afghanistan once.

Satterfield's awards include the Air Medal (two awards), Army Commendation Medal (two awards) and the Aviator Badge.