Haiti aid chopper crashes, two Americans killed

SANTO DOMINGO (Reuters) - Two Americans were killed when their helicopter, which was participating in aid and recovery operations in earthquake-hit Haiti, crashed in the Dominican Republic, aviation authorities said on Friday.

The U.S.-registered helicopter hit a mountain and burst into flames on Thursday evening at Restauracion, close to the Haitian border, some 175 miles northwest of Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic's National Institute of Civil Aviation said in a statement.

The institute identified the dead Americans as James Jalovec and John Ward from information they had filed on their flight plan.

The helicopter, a Robinson R44, belonged to a company registered in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and crashed on its way back to the Dominican Republic city of Santiago from the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, the agency said.

An aviation institute spokesman, Pedro Jimenez, said the helicopter had been helping with humanitarian operations for survivors of the Haitian earthquake, but he could give no more details of their mission or cargo.

The U.S. government and U.S. aid and charity groups have been spearheading a huge international relief operation to help hundreds of thousands of injured and homeless survivors of the Haitian quake that struck on January 12.

(Reporting by Manuel Jimenez; Editing by Pascal Fletcher and Peter Cooney)