Era Aviation Bell B206 II accident
Bell B206 II · Accident: roll over while maneuvering
From FIELD SITE, AK to Valdez Pioneer Field (VDZ)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC92LA065
- 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
- 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 B206 II
- Aircraft type
- Bell B206
- 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
- N371EH
- Operator
- Era Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From FIELD SITE, AKTo Valdez Pioneer Field (VDZ), Valdez, AK
- 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 · hover
- 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
- Roll over
- 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 › Procedures/directives, not followed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT LANDED SHORT OF HIS INTENDED DESTINATION DUE TO POOR WEATHER. AFTER SURVEYING THE AREA, HE DECIDED TO TAKEOFF AND ATTEMPT TO REACH HIS DESTINATION. DURING THE TAKEOFF SEQUENCE, HE LOST VISUAL REFERENCE DUE TO WHITEOUT CONDITIONS AND ABORTED THE TAKEOFF. THE HELICOPTER TOUCHED DOWN SOONER THAN HE EXPECTED. HE STATED HE DID NOT KNOW IF THE TERRAIN WAS LEVEL SO HE ELECTED TO HOVER TAXI BACK TO HIS ORIGINAL TAKEOFF POINT. DURING THE HOVER HE AGAIN LOST VISUAL REFERENCE AND THE HELICOPTER DRIFTED RIGHT, THE RIGHT SKID CONTACTED A LITTLE HILL AND THE HELICOPTER ROLLED OVER.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO FOLLOW THE COMPANY PROCEDURES AND DIRECTIVES. FACTOR WAS THE WHITEOUT CONDITIONS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC92LA065
- Event ID
- 20001211X14364
- Case number
- ANC92LA065
- 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: b0c61b1faee089642d165f8f32dfcb1708e42f17fb2b8f46e32b4d520df66b8e; retrieved 2026-09-18T18:47:05.923Z.