Overview
- Investigators report the aircraft struck an overhead power line before barreling into a stationary barge about half a mile downstream from the Alton Lock and Dam.
- Both occupants aboard the helicopter died on impact and no one was on the barge at the time of the collision.
- Rivers Pointe Fire District and Missouri State Highway Patrol crews extinguished the resulting blaze and secured the site.
- The Mississippi River has been closed to commercial navigation near East Alton, Illinois, roughly 20 miles north of St. Louis.
- Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board teams have been dispatched to examine the sequence of events.