ATL84LA294 · Hughes 269B
Hughes 269B · Accident: forced landing while maneuvering
From Saluda, SC to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL84LA294
- 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
Hughes 269B
- Aircraft type
- Hughes 269
- 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
- N9339F
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Saluda, SCTo 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
- Maneuvering
- 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
- Forced landing
- 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
- Dual student › Autorotation, improper
- Dual student › Rotor RPM, not maintained
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Proper descent rate, not corrected
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ACFT CRASHED DURING AN ATTEMPTED PRACTICE AUTOROTATION AFTER POWER WAS APPLIED TO EFFECT A RECOVERY. THE CFI, ON THEFLT, STATED THAT HE NOTICED THAT THE STUDENT WAS GOING TO OVERSHOOT AND INSTRUCTED HIM TO MAKE A POWER RECOVERY AT 100 FT AGL. HE SAID THAT THE ACFT SHUDDERED AND ENTERED A HIGH SINK RATE. BY THE TIME THE CFI TOOK THE CONTROLS, IT WAS NOTICED THAT THE ROTOR RPM WAS BELOW THE PROPER RANGE AND DECAYING. THE ENGINE RPM WAS NOTED TO BE NEAR ZERO. THE CFI REPORTED THAT HE THEN 'BOTTOMED' THE COLLECTIVE AND OPENED THE THROTTLE BUT THE ENGINE DID NOT RESPOND. IN SPITE OF THE CFI'S EFFORTS TO RECOVER, THE ACFT HIT THE GROUND TAIL LOW AND YAWED LEFT. AFTER SLIDING APRX 20 FT, THE ACFT ROLLED OVER. FAA CHECKED THE ENGINE AFTER THE ROLL OVER AND FOUND IT STARTED AND RAN NORMALLY WITH PROPER MAGNETO OPERATION ANDA SMOOTH IDLE AT 1300-1350 RPM. MANUALLY REDUCED TO 500-600 RPM THE LOW SIDE CUSHION RETURNED THE ENGINE TO NORMAL IDLE AT THROTTLE RELEASE. NO EVIDENCE OF AN ENGINE MALFUCTION WAS FOUND.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL84LA294
- Event ID
- 20001214X40981
- Case number
- ATL84LA294
- 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: a1a0f3a1cf58dcf0521118a147d8a09338eefa706ace37e85c46a0029fce75b2; retrieved 2026-09-23T19:06:10.484Z.