ANC90FA047 · de Havilland DHC-6
de Havilland DHC-6 · Accident: hard landing
From Bethel Airport (BET) to Chevak Airport (VAK)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC90FA047
- 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
de Havilland DHC-6
- Aircraft type
- de Havilland DHC-6
- Category
- Airplane
- 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
- N200EH
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Bethel Airport (BET), Bethel, AKTo Chevak Airport (VAK)
- 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
- Landing · flare/touchdown
- 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
- Hard landing
- 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 › Flare, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE SCHEDULED FLT DEPD BETHEL, AK, WITH A WX DISPATCH RELEASE. WHEN THE FLT REACHED THE DESTN (CHEVAK, AK), THE STATION MANAGER (A NON-CERTIFIED WX OBSERVER) ADZD THE FLT CREW TO NOT ATTEMPT A LNDG, BECAUSE THE WX WAS NOT GOOD. ACCORDING TO THE FLT CREW, HOWEVER, THE FOG WAS NOT OBSCURING THE RWY & THEY ELECTED TO MAKE AN APCH. ACCORDING TO THE PILOT (PIC), A HIGH SINK RATED DEVELOPED ON SHORT FINAL & HE DID NOT APPLY POWER. HE BELIEVED THE LNDG FLARE WOULD HAVE ARREST THE SINK RATE. HOWEVER, THE ACFT LNDD HARD ON THE RGT MAIN GEAR, CAUSING IT TO SEP & DMG THE RGT MAIN WING STRUT. THE RGT WING SETTLED TO THE SURFACE & THE ACFT YAWED TO THE RGT, VEERED OFF THE RWY & WAS FURTHER DMGD. THE LOAD MANIFEST DID NOT COMPLY WITH 14 CFR PART 135.63(C) OR THE COMPANY'S OPERATIONS MANUAL.
Probable cause
IMPROPER FLARE BY THE PILOT (PIC) DURING THE LANDING/FLARE. THE WEATHER CONDITION WITH FOG WAS A RELATED FACTOR.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC90FA047
- Event ID
- 20001212X22644
- Case number
- ANC90FA047
- 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: 2b1abd4041071b00f2ebcc7649998bf60b59f885e928f7960c5fafea6902e3f6; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:03:37.071Z.