Shocking moment Florida woman dies in fireball explosion after helicopter crash-landed on her home
Shocking bodycam footage showed the moment a Florida woman died after a rescue helicopter crashed into her home in a fiery explosion.
Deputy Mitchell Machado could be seen on bodycam footage striking at Lurean Wheaton's door in Pompano Beach with a baton as flames could be seen through the curtains around 9am.
Gray smoke billowed from the top of the roof, where a gapping hole had been left from the helicopter that had taken off from the Pompano Beach Airpark just moments before.
The 65-year-old was trapped inside her apartment and Machado could hear her cries for help, but was unable to reach her before the apartment exploded, pushing him backward, the bodycam showed.
'I tried cracking the windows, but I realized it was an impact window, so there was no way I was going to get in there with just a baton,' he said in a video released this week by police, who received a Medal of Honor for his heroic efforts from the Broward Sheriff's Office.
Impact windows have force-resistance glass and are reinforced. They also referred to as hurricane windows.
Wheaton died inside her apartment during the incident on August 26, 2023. The helicopter captain and flight paramedic, Terryson Jackson, 50, also died in the crash. He had been part of the Broward Sheriff's Office for 19 years, according to NBC Miami.
The two other crewmembers, Daron Roche and Mikael Chaguaceda, were able to crawl to safety, the outlet said.
Two others in the apartment building were injured.
Friends remember Wheaton as being a kind and humble person, who had previously faced drug addiction. She had been sober for more than a decade and lived in South Florida for 20 years.
'Lurean was fabulous, she was humble and an underdog,' Michael Varin, a friend, told NBC Miami at the time.
'She was the life of the party, she lit up with her smile, she knew how to enjoy her family when she came home and made sure she saw everyone,' Angela Williams, her niece, said of the South Carolina native.
Machado had been in the area when he saw the helicopter drop from the sky. The aircraft suffered from mechanical issues.
'I remember throwing my motorcycle down to the ground and running toward the building,' he said in the video.
He ran into other units in the building to evacuate residents, before trying to break into Wheaton's unsuccessfully.
He was honored with the Medal of Honor for preventing more lost lives and for helping without hesitation.
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