CHI00FA262 · Bell OH-58C
Bell OH-58C · Accident: loss of control in flight en route
From Baraboo Wisconsin Dells Regional Airport (DLL) to Wauwatosa, WI
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's operation. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI00FA262
- 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
- 2 · 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
- Government Narrative disagrees
- 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 OH-58C
- Aircraft type
- Bell OH-58
- 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
- N626SF
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Baraboo Wisconsin Dells Regional Airport (DLL), Baraboo, WITo Wauwatosa, WI
- 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
- Public Aircraft
- 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
- Company/operator mgmt › Inadequate surveillance of operation
- Pilot in command › Flight into adverse weather, performed
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › Spatial disorientation
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The Milwaukee County Sheriff's Aviation Department was operating as a public-use operator. The helicopter was on a cross-country flight when it impacted rolling terrain in a sparsely populated area. Witness described fog in the area at the time of the accident. The Milwaukee County Sheriff's Aviation Division's standard operating procedures (SOP's) states under section 3/033.05 Basic VFR Weather Minimums, that 'Basic VFR weather minimums shall conform to those minimums outlined in FAR 91.155 and 91.157.' In addition to these requirements, the night weather minimums for operations outside the local flying area were a ceiling of 1,000 feet and a visibility of 3 miles. The chief pilot reported and also made an entry into the helicopter's discrepancy log indicating that the attitude indicator was inoperative on May 19, 2000. There was no entry regarding corrective action for the attitude indicator. On June 4, 2000 a draft of an MEL, prepared by the chief pilot, stated that the attitude indicator is, 'Not required during daylight. Not required at night when in VMC [visual metrological conditions] conditions'. FAA-H-8083-21, Rotorcraft Flying Handbook, Chapter 12, Attitude Instrument Flying, states under Attitude Indicator: 'The attitude indicator provides a substitute for the natural horizon. It is the only instrument that provides an immediate and direct indication of the helicopter's pitch and bank attitude...'
Probable cause
The spatial disorientation by the pilot during continued flight into instrument conditions and the inadequate surveillance by the operator. The inoperative attitude indicator and night conditions were contributing factors.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI00FA262
- Event ID
- 20001212X21657
- Case number
- CHI00FA262
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2000-08-19.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 98e5c4b43ade4a31bbeb66e7b4675ff2346882e7ffd24d0f16571ed10bbb406f; retrieved 2026-09-20T20:55:08.402Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: operation. The narrative states "The Milwaukee County Sheriff's Aviation Department was operating as a public-use operator"; the flight was a public aircraft operation, not Part 91 general aviation.