LAX97LA057 · Bell 206B
Bell 206B · Accident: in flight collision with object while maneuvering
From MCGREGOR POINT, HI (no airport) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX97LA057
- 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 206B
- 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
- N6262N
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From MCGREGOR POINT, HI (no airport)To 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
- Maneuvering
- 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 object
- 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
- Utility pole
- 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 control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Distance, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The helicopter was operating in mountainous terrain assisting in the construction of power lines. The helicopter was positioning the passenger near the conductor lines in preparation for a line-pull. The passenger was sitting behind the pilot in the rear seat. The passenger would physically kick the travelers into the proper position at the top of the 80-foot metal pole in preparation for a line pull to establish proper tension. According to the witnesses, the helicopter was approaching pole number 89 from the upwind side to straighten the traveler. As they aligned the traveler and moved away, the rotor wash cocked the traveler off-line again. The helicopter reapproached the pole at a speed higher than before. The helicopter skid contacted the pole 2 feet below the top and the helicopter dynamically rolled over the top of the pole. The pole entered the pilot's doorway. The pilot released all controls and braced himself against the pole during the maneuver. The helicopter severed three main conductors before colliding with the ground.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to maintain control of the aircraft and distance from the pole.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX97LA057
- Event ID
- 20001208X07081
- Case number
- LAX97LA057
- 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: 13a47861fafc0919dfdba14d5412e7500d15fc837f082e13752aec77ef254e58; retrieved 2026-09-21T12:18:02.047Z.