A helicopter carrying five people on a private tour sputtered and crashed into New York''s East River shortly after takeoff from a riverbank heliport on Tuesday, killing one passenger and injuring three others. Emergency crews arrived within seconds of the crash to find the helicopter upside-down in the murky water with just its skids showing on the surface. The private chopper apparently had run into trouble and was trying to return to the heliport when it went into the river off 34th Street in midtown Manhattan, a few blocks south of the United Nations headquarters. It''s unclear what happened, but witnesses reported it was sputtering and appeared to be in some type of mechanical distress. The helicopter was from Linden, New Jersey, near the Statue of Liberty and the Newark, New Jersey, international airport and a popular base and refueling stop for helicopters operating in New York. The pilot, Paul Dudley, apparently reported problems in the helicopter and said he was turning around, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. The East River has been particularly tricky for pilots because of its many bridges and its proximity to LaGuardia, one of the nation''s busiest airports. In 2006, New York Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle died when the Cirrus light plane he was flying crashed into a residential building while trying to make a turn over the river. On Aug. 8, 2009, a small plane collided with a helicopter over the Hudson River, on the other side of Manhattan, killing nine people, including five Italian tourists. A government safety panel found that an air traffic controller who was on a personal phone call had contributed to the accident.