NYC92FA044 · MBB BO-105CBS
Omniflight Helicopters MBB BO-105CBS · Accident: loss of control in flight en route
From Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport (ITH) to Utica, NY
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC92FA044
- 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
- 3 · 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
MBB BO-105CBS
- Aircraft type
- MBB BO-105
- 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
- N750H
- Operator
- Omniflight Helicopters
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport (ITH), Ithaca, NYTo Utica, NY
- 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
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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
- Pilot in command › Altitude, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Spatial disorientation
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE MEDIVAC HELICOPTER WAS CRUISING AT 2700 FEET (700 FT AGL) WHEN IT SUDDENLY ENTERED A RIGHT TURN OF 95 DEG IN 15 SEC WHILE MAINTAINING ALTITUDE. THIS WAS FOLLOWED BY A DESCENDING LEFT TURN OF 60 DEG IN LESS THAN 5 SECONDS. THE HELICOPTER IMPACTED IN A SKIDS LEVEL, NOSE DOWN PITCH ATTITUDE. THE ACCIDENT OCCURRED AT NIGHT OVER AN UNLIGHTED AREA WITH OVERCAST CLOUD CONDITIONS. INTERVIEWS AND EXAMINATION OF COMPANY CORRESPONDENCE DISCLOSED THE PILOT HAD A DOCUMENTED PROBLEM WITH NIGHT FLYING AND NAVIGATION.
Probable cause
AN INFLIGHT COLLISION WITH TERRAIN AFTER THE PILOT EXPERIENCED SPATIAL DISORIENTATION. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE THE NIGHT CONDITIONS, AND THE LACK OF VISUAL CUES.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC92FA044
- Event ID
- 20001212X18648
- Case number
- NYC92FA044
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1991-12-10.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 6c2973137fc4379e6b8130a4a8e03083fa32a564fe16501daa35a6538d7a50a9; retrieved 2026-09-21T01:27:21.762Z.