The Glade 4.0

Two Navy instructor pilots from San Diego have been forever stripped of flying status and two student pilots will have to repeat training because of a September incident in which they dipped two $33 million helicopters into Lake Tahoe while trying to take photos for the squadron’s Facebook page, a Navy official said Wednesday.

The Sept. 13 incident became public because a bystander caught the event on video and posted it on YouTube.

The video shows the two MH-60R Seahawk helicopters trying to hover low, about 70 feet off the lake. One apparently loses control for a few seconds, smacks its landing gear in the water, then pulls up. Both aircraft went into the water, though the footage only captured one, Navy officials have said.

Both helicopters were damaged. Repairs to electronic antenna and other equipment totaled $505,000.

The Navy’s report on the incident, released Wednesday, holds harsh words for the two flight instructors, both lieutenants, at the controls that day.

“Their complacency, lack of flight discipline and succession of poor judgments nearly led to the loss of two aircraft and 10 U.S. Navy sailors for no benefit and did result in the damage of two aircraft.”

Another flight instructor riding in the rear of the helicopter was placed on a year of probation, during which flying will be off limits.

“The mishap was entirely preventable,” Vice Adm. Allen Myers, commander of all naval air forces, said in the report. “The aviation community was lucky this day, and a horrific loss of life was narrowly avoided.”

The Navy didn’t name the pilots involved because the punishments they received are considered administrative, and therefore private. A Navy official with knowledge of the case provided the details but declined to be named.

The loss of flight status for a pilot means he or she will have to seek a nonflying job in the Navy. With tight competition for officer slots, this action could be career-ending.

Retired Navy F-14 pilot and San Diego resident Steve Diamond called the punishment just, but “a crushing blow” for an aviator.

“It sends a message to a whole generation of aviators. ‘Hey, you can’t do this.’ So it has a higher purpose,” he said. “Aviation is unrelenting when it comes to risk and safety.”

The student pilots, who already have their aviator wings and were learning how to fly this specific aircraft, will have to repeat at least six months of training.

The 33-page report drew an unflattering portrait of the squadron involved, HSM-41 at North Island Naval Air Station. The unit’s purpose is to train pilots to fly the Seahawk.

The commanding officer at the time, who was not named, created a climate that contributed to the mishap, it concluded.

The year before, the commander himself flew over Lake Tahoe at a low altitude, about 200 feet from the water — something that had “no valid training or operational reason.” The report also criticized the commander for laissez-faire oversight of flights headed outside of San Diego.

That officer was replaced in the squadron 10 days after the September crash and is now doing graduate work at the Naval War College in Rhode Island, a Navy spokesman said. The replacement was not related to the incident.

The former commander’s career was not affected by the Tahoe mishap because “ultimately, nothing in the investigation indicated that accountability rested solely with him,” said Lt. Aaron Kakiel, a spokesman for Myers.

The two Navy helicopters were returning from participating in the California Capital Airshow at the former Mather Air Force Base. The report said one of the flight instructors organized the trip because the airshow was close to family members in Sacramento.

They decided to hover over Tahoe’s Emerald Bay so they could get a nearby island in the background of the shot, which they planned to offer for the squadron’s Facebook page.