Rangers surprised by parked helicopter at Red Rock Canyon — PHOTOS

Rangers at Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area are accustomed to finding lost hikers or the occasional abandoned car.

The helicopter was a new one. 

On Sunday, a park volunteer reported finding a small, two-seat helicopter in a wash near the upper White Rock parking area, at the end of a short dirt road off the park's popular scenic loop. There was no sign of the pilot, and Bureau of Land Management officials initially had no idea how the aircraft got there or how it would be removed.

As of Monday, Larry Joslyn was still working on that last part.

His Las Vegas company, LJ Air, owns the Schweizer 300C helicopter. Joslyn said his initial plan was to repair its damaged tail rotor and fly it out of Red Rock Canyon within an hour of it touching down. Now he's making arrangements to have it lifted onto a trailer and trucked out of the park.

LJ Air is leasing the helicopter to Airwork, a flight training, tour and charter company that operates out of North Las Vegas Airport.

Joslyn said an Airwork pilot was flying the helicopter with one passenger on board Saturday when she felt the aircraft losing power and decided to make an emergency landing.

"It wasn't even a crash. She was just doing it to be safe," Joslyn said.

But when the helicopter touched down, the tail rotor struck a bush, causing minor damage. Joslyn said the pilot and her passenger, both uninjured, simply walked out to the road and caught a ride out of the park.

He said he had to scrap his plan to fix the aircraft and and fly it out within an hour because he had to wait for flight investigators to come inspect the scene. The BLM didn't find out about the emergency landing until a park volunteer called it in the following day.

Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said the incident remains under investigation.

Joslyn said the helicopter has since been stripped of any instruments and other equipment that might prove vulnerable to vandals, thieves or the weather.

He said it might be there for up to a week because he's waiting on a larger helicopter to come lift it out of the wash and onto a truck.

Until then, it sits behind a strip of yellow caution tape, waiting to fly again.

Contact Henry Brean at hbrean@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0350. Follow @RefriedBrean on Twitter.