Royale Helicopter Service Bell 206B accident
Bell 206B · Accident: loss of engine power while maneuvering
From SPRUCE FORK, WV (no airport) to SAWMILL RUN, WV (no airport)
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD98FA005
- 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
- 4 · 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
- 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
- N911RH
- Operator
- Royale Helicopter Service
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From SPRUCE FORK, WV (no airport)To SAWMILL RUN, WV (no airport)
- 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
- 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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
- Manufacturer › Maintenance, overhaul, improper
- Turboshaft engine, free turbine governor › Failure
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
A helicopter was transporting passengers to a remote site when it dropped in a flat attitude and impacted into trees. A witness said he watched as the helicopter approached and circled the local area. As the helicopter flew overhead for the second time, he waved his arms to attract the pilot's attention. As the helicopter continued past him again, he thought that they were taking aerial photographs of the site. He said that the helicopter appeared to be lower and slower on its second pass overhead. Examination of the engine revealed uncommanded engine shut downs. During bench testing, the power turbine governor failed to limit fuel flow, and during disassembly it was revealed that a machine self locking hex nut had backed off the muscles valve stem. Examination of the muscles valve components revealed that the threaded valve stem was below the minimum requirements for a UNJ thread, and the flank angle was too large. The turbine governor, with zero Time Since Overhaul, was installed on the engine in January 1997. The governor was last overhauled at the manufacturer's facility during May-June 1996.
Probable cause
The improper overhaul of the turbine governor by the manufacturer, which resulted in the loss of power.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD98FA005
- Event ID
- 20001208X09034
- Case number
- IAD98FA005
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (5)
- 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: 118037389547c30c99252b8f32d4c90691b7c1c54317b8ef44812663d476be3c; retrieved 2026-09-18T13:27:36.652Z.
- The NTSB's operator name is blank for N911RH; the operator shown is the name the NTSB records it doing business as.