MKC90DCQ02 · Bell UH-1B
Bell UH-1B · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water while maneuvering
Event
- NTSB case
- MKC90DCQ02
- 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
- 1 · 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
Bell UH-1B
- Aircraft type
- Bell UH-1
- 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
- N8142W
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo 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 137: Agricultural
- 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 · aerial application
- 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 terrain/water
- 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 › Descent, inadvertent
- Pilot in command › Rotor RPM, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE HELICOPTER WAS REFUELED & LOADED WITH A SPRAY MIX, THEN THE PLT PROCEEDED TO A FIELD & BEGAN AERIAL APPLICATION. AFTER THE 2ND SWATH RUN, HE MANEUVERED THE HELICOPTER UP & OVER 'BIG' POWER LINES ON THE EAST END OF THE FIELD. AT ABOUT THAT TIME, THE HELICOPTER ENTERED A DESCENT & CRASHED. NO PREIMPACT MECHANICAL PROBLEM WAS FOUND DURING THE INVESTIGATION. THE OWNER ESTIMATED THE HELICOPTER HAD ABOUT 1983 LBS OF SPRAY & 900 LBS OF FUEL ON BOARD WHEN IT CRASHED.
Probable cause
THE PILOT FAILED TO MAINTAIN PROPER ROTOR RPM, WHILE MANEUVERING OVER A HIGH OBSTRUCTION (POWER LINE) AT THE END OF A SWATH RUN, WHICH RESULTED IN AN INADVERTENT DESCENT & COLLISION WITH THE TERRAIN. THE HIGH OBSTRUCTION WAS CONSIDERED TO BE A RELATED FACTOR.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MKC90DCQ02
- Event ID
- 20001212X23230
- Case number
- MKC90DCQ02
- 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: 5f1d703da8e17c4363a0e7c5ec05e1f5ccc7ad16972a4c0e7d676683fc2f8ffd; retrieved 2026-09-21T02:44:08.989Z.