National Helicopters Bell 206L-4 accident
Bell 206L-4 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From East 34th Street Heliport (6N5) to Atlantic City International Airport (ACY)
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO94FA135
- 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
- 3 · 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
- Charter & commuter
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Bell 206L-4
- Aircraft type
- Bell 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
- N124NH
- Operator
- National Helicopters
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From East 34th Street Heliport (6N5), New York City, NYTo Atlantic City International Airport (ACY), Atlantic City, NJ
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- En route · cruise
- 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 encounter with weather
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Visual flight rules (VFR) flight into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › Spatial disorientation
- Pilot in command › VFR flight into imc, inadvertent
Not plotted · Location withheld: coordinates are missing, conflicting, invalid, or have no accepted acquisition method. No substitute location has been invented.
NTSB narrative
The non-instrument rated commercial pilot was en route at 2000 feet msl on a night VFR flight when he reported an inadvertent encounter with instrument meteorological conditions. The helicopter (N124NH) subsequently crashed in a wooded area while in a steep descent. During the 35 minute flight, the pilot was in radio contact with air traffic control, the company dispatcher, and a company pilot in another helicopter. He was receiving VFR flight following service. During the flight, the pilot expressed concern about the weather to the other company pilot and indicated that he was going to turn back. He then reported that the weather had cleared and that he would proceed to the destination. However, later, he requested and was given a heading to reverse course because of fog. About 2 minutes thereafter (at 2105 edt), ATC lost radar contact with the flight. At about that same time, the other company pilot called to check the pilot's progress. The pilot (of N124NH) responded that he was going 'inverted.' There was no further transmission received from the pilot. An examination of the wreckage did not disclose a preimpact mechanical failure or malfunction.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S IMPROPER IN-FLIGHT PLANNING/DECISION, FLIGHT INTO INSTRUMENT METEOROLOGICAL CONDITIONS (IMC), AND SUBSEQUENT SPATIAL DISORIENTATION, WHICH RESULTED IN LOSS OF AIRCRAFT CONTROL. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: DARKNESS, THE ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS (FOG AND HAZE), AND THE PILOT'S LACK OF INSTRUMENT EXPERIENCE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO94FA135
- Event ID
- 20001206X01950
- Case number
- BFO94FA135
- 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 1994-08-13.
- API snapshot SHA-256: d0f4903ee9fd366e28901444da028df75c6f97badef8e4be6d933f7411b25d8f; retrieved 2026-09-18T13:47:58.252Z.