SEA83FA065 · Fairchild Hiller FH-1100
Fairchild Hiller FH-1100 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure en route
From Longview, WA (no airport) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA83FA065
- 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
Fairchild Hiller FH-1100
- Aircraft type
- Fairchild Hiller FH-1100
- 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
- N26631
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Longview, WA (no airport)To 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 · cruise
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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
- Rotor drive system, main gearbox/transmission › Failure, partial
- Rotor drive system, main gearbox/transmission › Fatigue
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
SEVERAL PERSONS SAW THE HELICOPTER FLYING AT A CRUISING ALTITUDE OF ABOUT 200 TO 300 FT, THEN ENTER A LOOP TYPE OF MANEUVER. THEY LOST SIGHT OF THE HELICOPTER NEAR THE BOTTOM OF THE MANEUVER BEFORE IT CRASHED. THE PLT RECEIVED SERIOUS HEAD INJURIES & COULD NOT RECALL WHAT HAD HAPPENED. AN EXAM OF THE AIRFRAME REVEALED THAT THE TRANSMISSION & MAIN ROTOR HUB ASSY HAD REMAINED PARTIALLY ATTACHED TO THE AIRFRAME THRU THE LEFT & RIGHT LONGITUDINAL TRANSMISSION STRUTS. BOTH THE LEFT & RIGHT VERTICAL AS WELL AS BOTH LEFT & RIGHT LATERAL TRANSMISSION STRUTS HAD SEPARATED NEAR THEIR ATTACH POINTS. A METALLURGICAL EXAM OF THESE PARTS REVEALED THAT FITTING ASSEMBLY, PN 24-61022-6 HAD FAILED AT A FATIGUE CRACK. ADDITIONALLY, CORROSION WAS FOUND WITHIN THE LEFT VERTICAL & LATERAL (ADJUSTABLE) TRANSMISSION STRUTS. PREIMPACT CONTINUITY OF THE CYCLIC PITCH CONTROL WAS VERIFIED.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA83FA065
- Event ID
- 20001214X42562
- Case number
- SEA83FA065
- 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: a9749987b255f18b44a2dbfca23bb3099703e63c7cad1a93e8a0e6603214743d; retrieved 2026-09-21T17:59:56.489Z.