BFO85FA013 · Aerospatiale SA 360C
Aerospatiale SA 360C · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) during initial climb
From Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) to 4N6 · Garden City, NY
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO85FA013
- 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
Aerospatiale SA 360C
- Aircraft type
- Aerospatiale SA-360
- 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
- N42CP
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA)To 4N6 · Garden City, NY
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Total loss of engine power (mechanical failure)
- 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
- Fuel starvation
- 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
- Fluid, fuel › Dumped
- Fluid, fuel › Leak
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Fuel system › Undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE FLT CREW RPRTD THE ENG LOST PWR WHEN THE HELICOPTER WAS AT APRX 100' WITH A FWD SPEED OF 50 KTS. WITNESSES OBSERVED FAINT GRAY/WHITE SMOKE EMANATING FROM THE VICINITY OF THE TAILPIPE SHORTLY AFTER LIFT OFF WHICH TRAILED & BECAME PROFUSEIMMEDIATELY BEFORE THE HELICOPTER BEGAN DSCNDG. SUBSEQUENTLY THE ACFT IMPACTED THE GND IN A LEVEL, RGT YAW ATTITUDE. THE RGT MAIN GEAR COLLAPSED & FOLDED UNDER THE BELLY, THE FUEL CELLS RUPTURED & THE TAIL CONE SEPARATED FROM THE CABIN. AN EXAM REVEALED THAT A MIXTURE OF FUEL & OIL HAD VENTED OVERBOARD THRU THE FLEXIBOX SEAL DRAIN LINE. ALTHO THE ACFT HAD RECENTLY BEEN WASHED, A HVY FUEL STAIN WAS NOTED ON THE UNDERSIDE OF THE HELICOPTER FROM THE GANG DRAIN TO THE FENESTRON. THERE WAS EVIDENCE THAT FUEL & OIL HAD LEAKED FROM THE JET HOLDER WHICH TRANSFERRED FUEL FROM A LINEAR LINE TO A ROTATING LINE. HOWEVER, AN EXAM OF THE FUEL (FLEXIBOX) & OIL (SEALOL) SEALS SHOWED NO IRREGULARITIES. THE CONDITION COULD NOT BE DUPLICATED DURING BENCH TESTING.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO85FA013
- Event ID
- 20001214X35474
- Case number
- BFO85FA013
- 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: e16047d9a3f0c19f95dac8c8756ce85399be91daab66e3a7c4ffe631e5e9f0cd; retrieved 2026-09-22T02:00:05.246Z.