FTW90LA099 · Enstrom F-28A
Enstrom F-28A · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From No airport to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW90LA099
- 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
- 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
Enstrom F-28A
- Aircraft type
- Enstrom F-28
- 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
- N287Q
- Operator
- Salaika, Tim · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From No airportTo not recorded
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern final
- 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
- In flight collision with object
- 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
- Wire, transmission
- 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 › Visual lookout, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT MADE A NIGHT LANDING TO THE OPERATOR'S PRIVATE STRIP AND WAS INSTRUCTED TO TAXI TO THE HELIPAD. INSTEAD, HE TOOK OFF AGAIN AND EXECUTED AN APPROACH TO A CONFINED AREA ADJACENT TO THE STRIP. THE PILOT THEN DISREGARDED THE OPERATOR'S RADIO INSTRUCTIONS TO LEAVE THE AIRCRAFT THERE AND PROCEEDED TO TAKE OFF AND EXECUTE TWO MORE APPROACHES TO THE AREA. ON THE THIRD APPROACH, THE AIRCRAFT STRUCK POWER LINES THAT WERE STRUNG THROUGHOUT THE AREA AND CRASHED. THE PILOT OFFERED NO EXPLANATION FOR HIS BEHAVIOR OR DISREGARD OF THE OPERATOR'S INSTRUCTIONS.
Probable cause
PILOT IN COMMAND'S FAILURE TO SEE AND AVOID WIRES DURING THE FINAL STAGE OF AN APPROACH TO A CONFINED AREA. A CONTRIBUTING FACTOR TO THE ACCIDENT WAS THE PILOT'S DISREGARD OF THE OPERATOR'S INSTRUCTIONS AFTER HE LANDED THE FIRST TIME.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW90LA099
- Event ID
- 20001212X22928
- Case number
- FTW90LA099
- 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 1990-04-22.
- API snapshot SHA-256: d97ce5e73600f2c8032ef6cbe7a36c10404bdb408b5fd0d84e137c93157511e2; retrieved 2026-09-21T23:54:47.387Z.