MIA97FA172 · Bell 206B
Bell 206B · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From Orlando Executive Airport (ORL) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA97FA172
- 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
- N61PP
- Operator
- Patrick E. Perrott · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Orlando Executive Airport (ORL), Orlando, FLTo 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 · hover out of ground effect
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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
- Tree(s)
- 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
- Object › Tree(s)
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Witnesses observed the helicopter hovering out of ground effect with a tailwind. The nose of the helicopter pitched nose high and the helicopter started to hover backwards. The nose yawed right and back to the left, and then started spinning to the right descending with the nose pitching up and down before the helicopter disappeared from view behind a tree line. Examination of the helicopter revealed no evidence of a precrash mechanical failure or malfunction of the airframe, flight controls, engine assembly or accessories. Review of the pilots logbook revealed he had not flown the helicopter in six months. The pilot stated he had not received any instruction in the loss of tailrotor effectiveness or uncommanded left or right yaw. He was not aware of the conditions required for this phenomenon to occur or what corrective action should be taken. Review of the flight manual revealed no written procedures pertaining to loss of tailrotor effectiveness or unanticipated right yaw.
Probable cause
The pilots improper in-flight planning/decision to conduct an out of ground effect hover with a tailwind resulting in an in-flight loss of directional control due to loss of tailrotor effectiveness/unanticipated right yaw, and subsequent in-flight collision with a tree and terrain. Contributing to the accident was the manufactures inadequate written procedures in the flight manual, and the pilot's inadequate training pertaining to the loss of tailrotor effectiveness/unanticipated right yaw.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA97FA172
- Event ID
- 20001208X07971
- Case number
- MIA97FA172
- 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: c4731c80b75a70862acb87b5959ab4dbb08fc1edbadd7d2f9c9ff866c35a3b8b; retrieved 2026-09-21T12:05:13.183Z.