A U.S. Coast Guard helicopter crew came to the rescue of their injured comrades after a companion helicopter crashed in the Uinta Mountains on Wednesday.

The two crafts were flying in tandem, returning to North Carolina from a Vancouver Olympics counterterrorism assignment, when they encountered heavy snow over Wasatch County.

Three guardsmen were injured in the crash. The Coast Guard helicopter flew two who were critically injured to University Hospital and a Life Flight helicopter transported the third. Two other crew members were not hurt.

"It's second nature to rescue people. In this situation, being our own people, I think that training was extremely helpful," said Petty Officer Andy Kendrick, a spokesman for the Elizabeth City, N.C., district where the crew is based.

The two helicopters had stopped Wednesday to refuel in Salt Lake City, but, after resuming their trip, hit bad weather just before 9 a.m. in Wasatch County, Kendrick said.

The MH-60T Jayhawk's blades ripped to pieces as it plowed through a thick cover of pine trees. It slammed into a hillside in the Silver Meadows area on top of Soapstone Pass, about 50 miles east of Salt Lake City.

The impact left flight mechanic Gina Panuzzi, a petty officer second class, with a large loss of blood from a critical abdomen wound, said Buzz Burgener, a Wasatch County Search and Rescue volunteer.

The co-pilot's leg was crushed when his side of the helicopter hit a tree; the pilot had internal injuries. The pilot and co-pilot are Cmdr. Patrick Shaw and Lt. Cmdr. Steven Cerveny, though it wasn't immediately clear who was at the controls.

Working under the heavy snowfall at an elevation of 9,600 feet, the second pilot landed his helicopter on the heavily wooded hillside.

The crew brought Panuzzi and the pilot into the helicopter and flew them to University Hospital, both in critical condition.

At least one of the crew members hit his emergency beacon, which alerted local dispatchers.

Summit and Wasatch counties' search and rescue crews on snowmobiles reached the site in about an hour and brought down the other two members of the crew. Petty Officers 3rd Class Darren Hicks and Edward Sychra were checked out at area hospitals as a precaution but weren't hurt.

Without the second crew of fellow guardsmen, the situation could have been much more dire for the injured crew, Burgener said.

They were "very, very, lucky," to have expert rescuers so close, he said.

"Everyone was alert and talking, including the people who went to the hospital," said Wasatch County sheriff's Sgt. Jeremy Hales.

The Coast Guard is investigating what caused the crash, though weather appears to be a factor.

The downed crew is trained to fly helicopters in support of the Coast Guard's Maritime Security Response Team, which is trained to stop terrorism threats by sea. They were en route to Kansas City for an overnight stay on the way back to North Carolina.

Rick Egan contributed to this report.