ANC94LA110 · Bell B-206
Bell B-206 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water on approach
From REID BEACH, AK to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC94LA110
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Bell B-206
- Aircraft type
- Bell B-206
- Category
- Helicopter
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N382EH
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From REID BEACH, AKTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Approach
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- In flight collision with terrain/water
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Distance/altitude, misjudged
- Pilot in command › Lack of recent experience in type operation
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT WAS LANDING ON THE BEACH AT DUSK, AND IT WAS DARKER THAN HE HAD EXPECTED. THE AREA WAS COVERED BY A SHADOW FROM A MOUNTAIN. HE ABORTED HIS FIRST APPROACH AFTER REALIZING HIS RATE OF DESCENT AND APPROACH SPEED WERE TOO FAST. HE STATED THAT THE SECOND APPROACH APPEARED NORMAL, AND AT THE LAST MOMENT SAW THE RIPPLES ON THE WATER, TRIED TO PULL UP, BUT THE HELICOPTER IMPACTED THE WATER, NOSED OVER, AND FLOATED UPSIDE DOWN. THE PILOT STATED THAT HIS EYES DID NOT HAVE TIME TO ADJUST TO THE DIFFERENCE IN THE LIGHTING CONDITIONS HE ENCOUNTERED DURING THE APPROACH. HE REPORTED A TOTAL NIGHT FLIGHT TIME OF 267 HRS, WITH 0.4 HRS WITHIN THE PRECEDING 90 DAYS.
Probable cause
THE PILOT MISJUDGED HIS DISTANCE/ALTITUDE FROM THE LANDING AREA, AND HIS LACK OF RECENT NIGHT FLYING EXPERIENCE. FACTORS WHICH CONTRIBUTED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO ASSURE THAT HE WOULD BE LANDING WITH SUFFICIENT LIGHT, AND THE DUSK/DARK LIGHT CONDITION.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC94LA110
- Event ID
- 20001206X01911
- Case number
- ANC94LA110
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1994-08-31.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 91f6b67882d30b67605f1c89dc4296f95f13159aff28adc499caf9a8e8d6a744; retrieved 2026-09-23T00:44:28.332Z.