LAX95TA328 · McDonnell Douglas 369D
McDonnell Douglas 369D · Accident: rotor failure/malfunction en route
From Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL) to Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX95TA328
- 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
- Government
- 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
McDonnell Douglas 369D
- Aircraft type
- McDonnell Douglas 369
- 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
- N58388
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL), Honolulu, HITo Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL), HI
- 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
- Public Aircraft
- 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
- Rotor failure/malfunction
- 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 › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE FIRE DEPARTMENT HELICOPTER PILOT WAS RETURNING TO THE HOME BASE AFTER SURVEYING A BRUSHFIRE. HIS ROUTE OF FLIGHT WAS ACROSS A MOUNTAIN RIDGELINE. JUST AFTER THE CROSSING, THE PILOT FELT A BUMP TO THE REAR OF THE HELICOPTER. A SEVERE VIBRATION WAS FELT IN THE TAIL ROTOR ANTITORQUE PEDALS. THE PILOT ATTEMPTED TO GUIDE THE HELICOPTER TO A SUITABLE LANDING AREA. UPON REACHING THE ONLY SITE AVAILABLE, THE HELICOPTER BEGAN TO ROTATE ABOUT THE VERTICAL AXIS, LANDING HARD ON A RIDGELINE. THE HELICOPTER WAS BEING OPERATED WITH THE DOORS OFF AND THE PILOT'S FLIGHT JACKET WAS MISSING. LABORATORY ANALYSIS OF FIBERS FOUND ON A TAIL ROTOR BLADE MATCHED FIBERS FROM A STANDARD ISSUE FIRE DEPARTMENT JACKET SIMILAR TO THE PILOT'S JACKET THAT WAS MISSING.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to secure his cargo/personal belongings which departed from the aircraft and struck the tail rotor.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX95TA328
- Event ID
- 20001207X04538
- Case number
- LAX95TA328
- 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: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 12d6f77b5f9cd9de46ff2a02009dd7ff987c0bd7d4c7b7a1d58031cbbbcca399; retrieved 2026-09-18T21:22:13.130Z.