Welcome back to weather command of Fox Weather breaking news
story Right now,
the US Marine Corps searching for a missing helicopter with
five Marines on board.
It was on route from Creech Air Force Base in
Clark County,
Nevada. And then that was last night.
It was on its way to Marine Corps in the
Miramar,
Southern California base.
They don't know what's happened.
The San Diego Sheriff's Office attempted to send a search
helicopter,
but the chopper was right,
you know, reported overdue. They got out and they had
to recall their helicopter.
Due to the ongoing atmospheric river storm that's happening in
the West right now,
it is unclear if whether it's played a role in
the missing aircraft,
but we know that it impeded part of the search.
Fox 5 San Diego reporter Heather Lake is in Pine
Valley,
CA. Heather. Low visibility snows,
probably hindering the situation. You're there in Pine Valley,
it's 3900 feet elevation. You're right at the freezing point
.32° with snow,
right? And so it's really cold out here And I
will tell you that the conditions in San Diego not
used to what this Cal Fire team and these crews
are used to search and rescue effort.
So I want to give you a look around too,
so that you can see what's going on.
We got heavy precipitation, mix of rain and snow melting
by the time it gets to the ground.
But where they heard the last ping and where they
got the information from,
the location of where this missing helicopter could be with
U.S.
Marines, five U.S. Marines on board.
Word is about a few miles from where we are
and it's at
5300 feet where some of the snow is accumulating anywhere
today from 6 to 10 inches and even more on
the way.
So we have that winter storm warning that is in
effect right now.
And what we do know is that these Marines were
traveling from that Creech Air Force Base,
which is just northwest of Las Vegas,
back to San Diego to Miramar Air Station here.
We know that five U.S.
Marines were on that helicopter,
and what we know is that right now they were
overdue.
It was reported overdue around 2:20 this morning.
So they were waiting for daylight.
And we have several search and rescue efforts underway from
several different agencies.
We're talking about the US Forestry Division,
San Diego Sheriff's Department, Borstar,
which is the border agent.
And they said they've got to do it old school.
So not only do they have drones up and they're
using technology today as opposed to putting a helicopter up
in the air,
but they also have people that have got their big
backpacks on.
They've suited up and now they're on foot in this
kind of weather.
So these conditions definitely not good for search and rescue
efforts,
but still hoping for the best out here.
Again, all of this came in at 2:20 in the
morning.
We've got a mix of pretty heavy wet snow coming
down,
mix of precipitation changing into rain as the temperatures change
and move throughout the day.
But this winter storm warning definitely affecting not only what
they're dealing with here with those search and rescue efforts,
but the terrain really hard in this area too.
These are the mountains. We have 4 micro climates in
San San Diego and when you get up to the
mountains there's a lot of mixed terrain and they're dealing
with heavy snow conditions. On a day like today,
after we've already seen Amy,
those atmospheric rivers move through San Diego,
drench us down in the city and then put snow
up in our mountains.
Looks like the winter storm warnings going to be in
effect there until noon tomorrow.
Have you been able to see any rescue efforts or
search efforts that have been ongoing?
Because just from the vantage point in your backdrop,
the visibility looks to be awful.
I don't know how they could get aircraft up to
look.
Yeah, there won't be any aircrafts going up.
We actually talked to the search and rescue teams that
are here from Cal Fire.
So we're at Kitchen Creek helicopter base.
They won't be sending any helicopters up from here.
They've been talking to the local Coast Guard units down
in San Diego to see if they could get anything
up in the air.
As of right now, all of these efforts are kind
of communicating with each other,
all these different agencies. But what we did just see
is Borstar,
which is our Border Patrol,
search and rescue crews putting on backpacks,
getting in their vehicles. So they're going to be doing
it old school.
They're going to be basically hiking up in those mountains
and hoping for the best.
That last ping again coming from that helicopter and that's
just miles from here,
but still at 5300 feet and lots of snow on
the ground where they're going to be hiking today.
Tough conditions off road vehicles probably used until they can't
be and as you say they will have to get
on foot to look
very, very tough situation. We'll continue to get with you
there in in the Southern California area to get updates,
Fox fives, Heather Lake in Pine Valley,
CA.