Rangers Respond To Fatal Air Crash Just Outside Park

On the evening of Friday, April 18th, the California Office of Emergency Services contacted park personnel and advised that the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center was receiving an aircraft ELT (emergency locator transmitter) signal that appeared to be coming from within the park. Yosemite SAR personnel immediately put a contract helicopter that was already in the park on standby, then began making preparations to commit it to a search effort. While doing so, the wreckage was sighted on the ground from a civilian airplane. Ranger/paramedics Keith Lober and Matt Stark were picked up from the Yosemite Valley LZ and flown to the accident site. They determined that the downed plane’s two occupants had evidently been killed immediately upon impact. The plane’s location was found to be just outside the park’s jurisdiction, to the incident was turned over to the Tuolumne County Sheriff’s Office.