SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - No one was injured after a helicopter crashed about 200 kilometres north of Yellowknife Tuesday afternoon.

Jeff Denomme, president of Great Slave Helicopters, said the helicopter - a Eurocopter AS350 B2 - was travelling to Pellatt Lake from Yellowknife. He said the helicopter had a "roll over," but couldn't comment on how the accident happened beyond that. He said none of the three people on board, one pilot and two passengers, were hurt.

Ross Peden, an investigator with the Transportation Safety Board of Canada, said the cause of the accident is still being investigated, but it is believed to be weather-related and not mechanical. At the time of the accident - around 12:20 p.m. - visibility in the area was reduced to 1.6 km by blowing snow and the temperature was -24 C - -38 C with the windchill.

Second lieutenant Mike Behring of the Rescue Co-ordination Centre (RCC) at Canadian Forces Base Trenton in Ontario said members from the Yellowknife 440 Squadron responded to the accident site near the Ekati mine.

Behring said the RCC became aware of the incident after the helicopter's emergency locator transmitter was triggered by the force of the crash and a signal was sent by satellite to CFB Trenton.

"Sometimes it's a false alarm. Sometimes it's not. So, in our investigation we found out this was indeed a crash, and then at that point we organized the response."

Behring agreed there were no injuries. "We talked to the pilot on satellite phone, and he actually sounded in pretty good spirits. They were building a shelter. All their equipment burned up in the crash, so that's probably the worst part of it," he said.

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