Police interview model craft operators

TAMPA - Police say they've identifed and questioned all three men who were flying model helicopters and planes last friday when one slammed into a girl, smashing her hand and leaving her with a nasty head wound.

According to police, one of them said an electronic controller failed, causing the machine to lose power and hit her.

Maresa Poole, 17, was hit in the head and arm by a model chopper as she walked across Tampa's Gadsden Park. it took 17 staples to close a head wound, and surgery to fix a shattered finger and bruised hand. Nearly a week later, her mom says she is still in a lot of pain.

"She's doing ok. She's sore, she's got bruising from the falling, but besides that she's doing okay," Michelle Poole said.

Police have interviewed all three men involved in the incident, including the one operating the helicopter that struck Maresa.

He said an electronic controller failed, causing the machine to lose power and hit her, according to police.

Still, the enthusiasts who fly radio-controlled helicopters and airplanes are upset about what happened, and say they fly according to the rules, and that the guys that hurt the girl couldn't' have been flying safely.

"The main rule is you don't fly over people's heads, you don't fly a certain distance to them. In other words, you gotta keep your distance away," says model helicopter expert Rolando
Perez.

Maresa said right before the collision, the helicopter seemed to keep coming closer and closer.

"I heard it go around me", she says, "and then I heard it like gashing my ear."

Perez opens a helicopter and points to a circuit board, telling us, "the controller is down there." It's the component the men say failed. Perez says he's seen them fail in the past, but he also says, it's unusual for the controllers to fail.

"Very, very unusual," he said.

Investigators say one of the men flying that day may have saved Maresa's life by calling 911 and taking off his shirt to put pressure on her wounds until help arrived.

He told the 9-11 operator: "she's got blood all over her."

"Just take a clean dry cloth and apply pressure where the bleeding is," came the 911 operator's reply.

While waiting for a decision from police, Maresa's family says they've been touched by the thousands of model flying hobbyists who've inundated websites with best wishes, and donations.

Several thousand dollars have been pledged now from 33 states and 14 foreign countries.