From the Center for Investigative Reporting in PRX, this is Reveal. I'm Al Etzane.

On a freezing January morning in 2014, a Navy Sea Dragon helicopter was on a training mission

over the Atlantic when a fire broke out in the cabin. Seconds later, it slammed into the ocean.

We are continuing our breaking news coverage now involving the Navy chopper crash.

Yeah, just to bring you up to speed, five sailors were on board, one died. Another is still missing.

And other three still at the hospital recovering. One of the injured sailors died at the hospital,

and the body of another was recovered days later, bringing the death toll to three.

Most definitely this particular helicopter is assigned to the HM14 squadron based out of

Naval Station Norfolk. It's just under 100 feet long, 28 feet tall. I'm just scrolling through

Facebook and I see a bunch of mutual friends talking about this helicopter crash and saying,

rest in peace, Brian Collins. And I didn't like believe it at first.

Jason Paladino went to high school with Brian Collins. One of the sailors killed in the crash.

I read the news stories they were linking to, and then I just quickly, you know,

fire off a couple of Facebook messages to our close friends and said,

is this for real? And they said, yeah. So at that point, I started getting in touch with people

and finding out what really happened. Jason and Brian grew up in the mountains of the North

and California and trucky just down the highway from Lake Tahoe. After graduation,

Jason went off to study journalism at the University of California, Berkeley. Brian enlisted in the Navy.

He was extremely driven and motivated and he started working out a lot and going across

the bed and trying to get in the physical shape for his training. He originally wanted to be a seal,

but yeah, so he basically just devoted himself to this. Two weeks after the accident,

Jason joined hundreds of others at trucky high school for Brian's memorial service.

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