Aug. 10—It was around 12:30 p.m. when the Beechcraft King Air 300 began its approach into a small airport in Chinle, Arizona. The winds were strong, but the skies were blue and clear in every direction as the CSI Aviation plane descended.
Pilot Jeffrey Tuning, 66, and copilot Amanda Benson, 25, Tuning’s stepdaughter, were at the controls as paramedic Nick Mancuso and nurse Kameilia Chavez sat in the back — prepared to treat and transport a patient back to Albuquerque.
It was the second medical transport flight of the day and business as usual.
Until it wasn’t.
The aircraft crashed alongside a service road adjacent to the runway and burst into flames — killing all four onboard and leaving families, friends and colleagues in New Mexico and across the country reeling.
A relative of Tuning was not prepared to speak Saturday, and Benson’s family could not be reached. Both are from Port St. Lucie, Florida, while Mancuso and Chavez are from Albuquerque.
Allen Weh, founder and president of Albuquerque-based CSI Aviation, said he was at his desk Aug. 5 when he heard there had been “a fatality.” Soon the gravity of the situation came into focus: the details were slim because everyone was dead.
“I’ve been in three wars, and I’ve seen men die … and you kind of suck it up, and you do what you got to do,” Weh said. “It’s a hit in the stomach, but you got to do what you got to do. Because guess what? People are looking at you, depending on you — a leader should never fall apart. Never fall apart.”
Weh said the nature of their business is flying into “barely maintained” airports like Chinle Airport on the Navajo Nation, places that he said have no air traffic control tower and less than ideal runway parameters and upkeep. Despite those challenges and flying thousands of medevac flights a year, the crash was something Weh has never had to deal with in the company’s 46 years.
He said the plane had no reported concerns and he wasn’t aware of any distress signals from the aircraft before it went down. Weh said it was the first and, hopefully, the last such occurrence.
“Something did go wrong,” he said. “I don’t think anybody’s going to dispute that.”
Weh said they had a company-wide shutdown of flights due to the “trauma and impact” and brought in counselors for the colleagues of those killed. He said they have checked in on the families daily.
“We were all saddened beyond words, and going through the process has made us stronger. We understand that our role is to help people — that’s what air ambulance work does,” Weh said. “We’re doing that, and we’re back to doing it — and we’re going to remember the four fallen ones.”
The first medical flight out of Albuquerque will launch Monday, he said. Weh added, “If we don’t go, who will?”
Nick Mancuso
For as long as anyone close to him can remember, Nick Mancuso, 37, wanted to be a flight paramedic. And he worked toward that goal for over 13 years until he was hired in February 2024 at CSI Aviation.
“I think the only time I had seen him more excited was when I saw him shortly after his daughter was born,” Clay Tabb, Mancuso’s longtime friend and colleague, told the Journal.
Tabb said Mancuso had every ability to be a doctor, but he loved the one-on-one care with patients that being a paramedic provided. And being in the sky gave him the challenge he often sought.
“He was truly the smartest and most dedicated medic I’ve ever known,” he said.
Tabb said he and Mancuso bonded over a love of punk rock, crudely done tattoos and gauged ears when they met in 2013 while taking paramedic classes at Central New Mexico Community College. The pair would go on to work together on ambulances at several different agencies in Albuquerque and surrounding areas.
Mancuso, who carried a calm presence and easy smile to every call, had a way with patients, no matter their age or background — whether it was a trauma event or drug overdose. Tabb said, “He never gave false hope, because we were taught that in school. But Nick had a way of making you feel like he was going to be able to get everything fixed.”
He remembered one call in which Mancuso calmed both a mother suffering a heart attack and her panicked son.
“It was the calmness in his voice and the confidence that he carried with himself … and I remember just kind of standing back watching in awe, because even I was kind of panicking on the inside,” Tabb said.
Mancuso was also a character.
At Living Cross Ambulance, Tabb said he laid claim to a grungy old couch that looked like “it had been pulled from a homeless encampment.”
“When we would run fast and heavy, and not get a chance to breathe, you always knew where Nick was going to be if we made it back — there would be a trail of boots heading to that couch, and he would be face down on it,” Tabb said.
Tabb lightened up, remembering how Mancuso would don four pairs of gloves so he could eat “extra-saucy” wings and drive the ambulance. If he had to turn a knob or adjust something, one glove would come off.
The pair would often listen to death metal and hope they were transporting a patient to the hospital near the Buffalo Wild Wings.
“I think it gets used kind of generically or as cliché anytime someone passes away, especially when it’s an event like this, but at least in my eyes, he was one of the best,” Tabb said.
For his wife, Ashley Mancuso, the nights are quieter now.
She said one of her favorite things the two shared, among many, was their nighttime ritual: putting their 4-year-old daughter Lennyn, or “Lenny,” to bed.
“For the past four years, every night that she was home with us … we would do it together, and it was this whole routine of, like, a little playtime, two to three storybooks and staying in her room with her until she fell asleep,” Mancuso said.
She said Mancuso was a doting father and modeled his own duties after the father of Bluey, an Australian cartoon and Lennyn’s favorite. He would get up in the night to settle her, make bottles and change diapers 50/50 with his wife.
“Nick kind of idolized that little cartoon because he just tried to be everything to Lenny,” Mancuso said.
While family came first, Mancuso loved his work second and had a thirst for knowledge that went beyond the field of medicine, she said. Known fondly by friends as “Nickapedia,” Mancuso loved long discussions on topics such as philosophy and history, and appreciated a good scotch and The Times crossword puzzle.
Mancuso said she learned her husband was gone from her desk at work, hours after the crash. The shock lasted for days, but it’s wearing off.
“It’s hitting harder in ways,” she said. “But at the same time, I’ve been telling this to a lot of people … he lived such a full life. … A part of me knows that he was OK with what happened.”
Mancuso added, “He was not religious but very spiritual and believed in the universe. And if it was the universe calling him or deciding it was his time, he had a deep understanding of that.”
Kameilia Chavez
Kameilia Chavez, 38, was everything to her friends and family. A mother of two, wife and experienced nurse, Chavez brought light and positivity to her loved ones every single day.
“She was just an overall great person,” said Maricia Chavez, a friend and coworker. The two had worked together for four years in an emergency room, saving people’s lives and getting them through medical emergencies.
“She came to work with a great attitude every day, ready to tackle what the day had ahead of her. She would sit there and hold somebody’s hand in the hardest of times, and she could get to the person’s level… and just explain things to them so that way they could understand.”
Maricia said Chavez was the type of person who could turn a bad day into a great one, with a positive attitude and a smile that was as bright as her personality.
Maricia often relied on Chavez as an experienced coworker. And, as a friend, someone she could tell anything to.
“She was there when she knew you needed something,” Maricia Chavez said. “She was there when you needed backup, and she was always willing to help. She went above and beyond for all her patients.”
Every day at work, Chavez would talk about her two children, telling coworkers about trips the family had been on, what the kids learned in school and all of her husband’s accomplishments.
“Most of her time was spent with her boys and her husband,” Maricia Chavez said. “That was the highlight of her life, (being) with her family.”
When Chavez wasn’t on duty as a flight nurse or spending time with her family, she could be found in the gym, sharpening her body and focusing on her health to continue to provide for others.
“She loved to work out and take care of herself,” Maricia Chavez said.
Maricia Chavez was devastated to find out she had lost her friend, calling it a complete shock.
“I’m just trying to go into work every day with a little bit of her in my mind,” she said. “Knowing that if I push a little harder, I can be just as good as she was.”