Helicopter carrying 6 people that crashed in California desert departed from Palm Springs

A helicopter carrying six people crashed in a Southern California desert late Friday departed from Palm Springs before crashing, the latest in a number of high-profile aviation disasters in the U.S.

Two crew members and four passengers are confirmed dead in the fiery crash. The CEO of one of Nigeria's largest banks was among the victims, along with his wife and son.

Herbert Wigwe, chief executive of Access Bank, was among the six people on board when the aircraft went down shortly after 10 p.m. All six people were killed, including two pilots and Bamofin Abimbola Ogunbanjo, former chair of NGX Group, the Nigerian stock exchange.

The deaths of Wigwe, his family and Ogunbanjo were confirmed Saturday by Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a former Nigerian finance minister who is now the director-general of the World Trade Organization.

“Terribly saddened by the news of the terrible loss of Herbert Wigwe ... his wife and son as well as Bimbo Ogunbanjo in a helicopter crash,” Okonjo-Iweala wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. “May the souls of the departed rest in perfect peace.”

The death of Wigwe, 57, shocked many in Nigeria and in the banking sector. He was widely seen as an industry leader, having been involved in two of the country’s biggest banks, including Guaranty Trust Bank, where he was previously executive director.

Under Wigwe’s leadership, Access Bank’s assets and presence grew beyond borders in several African countries.

His death is “a terrible blow” for Nigeria and Africa’s banking industry, Nigerian presidential spokesman Bayo Onanuga wrote on X. “Wigwe had a big vision to make Access Holdings (the parent company) Africa’s biggest, with all the unquenchable thirst for acquisitions,” Onanuga added.

Wigwe’s interests also spanned the education sector. His private university, founded in Nigeria’s oil-rich Niger Delta region where he was from, is scheduled to open in September. Last year he said the university was “an opportunity for me to give back to society.”

“This is surreal and I am lost for words,” Festus Keyamo, Nigeria’s minister of aviation and aerospace development, wrote in a post on X. “May Almighty God comfort his aged parents and sibling ... his immediate family members, his staff, friends across Nigeria and dependents.”

The Federal Aviation Administration confirmed Saturday it and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the crash of the Eurocopter EC 130 helicopter.

The NTSB confirmed Saturday that the helicopter departed from Palm Springs at 8:45 p.m. with a destination of Boulder City, Nevada. At 10:08 the aircraft "impacted terrain" about 75 miles northeast of Barstow, south of Interstate 15. The NTSB said it was a charter flight was operated Orbic Air LLC.

The NTSB said the the helicopter's charter company is linked with an address in Camarillo but based in Burbank. Information from Flight Aware also indicates the helicopter took off from the Camarillo Airport shortly before 5:30 p.m. Friday and stopped in Burbank before continuing to Palm Springs.

The NTSB said it is presently gathering evidence at the scene. While a preliminary report will be available in a "couple of weeks," the NTSB said the full investigation into the crash could take between 12 and 24 months. The investigation will include witness reports of rain and a "wintry mix" of conditions reported in the area. Downed power lines also were reported in the area.

The NTSB said the helicopter was not equipped with a voice data recorder or a flight data recorder, nor was it require to do so.

The areas of investigation for the NTSB:

• air "worthiness" of the craft, including maintenance and structure of the helicopter

• operations

• meteorology

• air traffic control

The NTSB asks that anyone who witnessed the crash while driving on I-15 reach out with any information, including photos, that might aid in the investigation at witness@ntsb.gov.

The crash follows two deadly aviation disasters in recent days.

At least two people were killed Friday afternoon when a small plane that had lost both its engines crashed into a vehicle on a Florida interstate as the pilot attempted to make an emergency landing, authorities said. And earlier this week, five U.S. Marines died after a military helicopter went down in the mountains near San Diego.

Many aviation disasters have happened in California

Southern California is busy hub for military and small aircraft and has a long history of aviation tragedies and near-disasters.

In June 2022, three military aircraft crashes occurred in Southern California in the span of a week. U.S. Navy pilot Lt. Richard Bullock was killed on June 3 when his F/A-18E Super Hornet crashed near Trona. Days later, five Marines on an MV-22B Osprey died when the aircraft crashed in a California desert near the Arizona border during training. A Navy helicopter crashed in the same region and all four crew members survived.

In July, six people died after a Cessna C550 crashed near the French Valley Airport in Murrieta, California. It happened just days after a 39-year-old man was killed and three children were injured near the same airport.

This past January, a Navy helicopter crashed off the coast of Coronado, California with all six aboard surviving.

Jack Cress, an instructor in the Aviation Safety & Security Program at the University of Southern California and a former helicopter pilot in the U.S. Marine Corps. said that while the Southern California's mountainous terrain and weather events like the atmospheric river can pose a challenge for pilots, the high traffic likely contributes to the number of accidents.

"Accident rates may be a little bit higher in California than others, but I would assume if it's the case, it would most likely be because of volume more than anything else," said Cress.

Contributing: The Desert Sun in Palm Springs, Calif., and the Ventura County Star in Camarillo, Calif.

Contact reporter Krystal Nurse at knurse@USATODAY.com. Follow her on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, @KrystalRNurse.

Contributing: The Associated Press; Christopher Cann, Natalie Neysa Alund, Claire Thornton and Minnah Arshad USA TODAY; Luis Zambrano and Kate Cimini, USA TODAY NETWORK

This is a developing story and will be updated.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Helicopter that crashed in desert departed from Palm Springs