LAX88FA241 · Helio HST-550A
Perris Valley Skydiving Helio HST-550A · Accident: loss of control in flight en route
From Perris Valley Airport (L65) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX88FA241
- 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
Helio HST-550A
- Aircraft type
- Helio HST-550
- 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
- N9991F
- Operator
- Perris Valley Skydiving
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Perris Valley Airport (L65), Perris, CATo 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
- En route · descent
- 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
- Elevator trim › Uncontrolled
- Flt control syst, stabilator trim › Failure, total
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Perris, CA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
AFTER DROPPING SKYDIVERS THE PILOT ENTERED A DESCENT TO RETURN TO THE AIRPORT FOR ANOTHER LOAD OF JUMPERS. HE WAS RECEIVING RADAR ADVISORIES DURING THE DROP FROM A TRACON CONTROLLER. AS THE AIRCRAFT DESCENDED BELOW 4,000 FEET MSL THE CONTROLLER TERMINATED THE RADAR ADVISORY SERVICE. IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE CONTROLLER DISCONTINUED THE SERVICE HE ASKED THE PILOT TO CHECK FOR A STUCK MICROPHONE SWITCH. THE AIRCRAFT CONTINUED ITS DESCENT AND COLLIDED WITH A CAMPING TRAILER AND BUILDING UNDER CONSTRUCTION IN AN EXTREME NOSE LOW ATTITUDE. THE ELEVATOR TRIM WAS FOUND IN THE FULL NOSE DOWN POSITION. NO OTHER MALFUNCTIONS WERE FOUND.
Probable cause
FAILURE OF THE ELECTRICAL STABILIZER TRIM CONTROL THAT RESULTED IN AN UNCOMMANDED FULL NOSE DOWN ELEVATOR TRIM COMMAND.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX88FA241
- Event ID
- 20001213X25979
- Case number
- LAX88FA241
- 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: 62d0e09f51d56ccfedd753846a90317e5c36f9f7bf72c1a61e5e0cd3f58acf71; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:40:14.700Z.