Omni Flight Offshore Bell 206L-1 accident
Bell 206L-1 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's damage. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW86LRA07
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Bell 206L-1
- Aircraft type
- Bell 206
- 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
- N5748Y
- Operator
- Omni Flight Offshore
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- In flight encounter with weather
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- None Possible conflict
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, inadvertent
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, not followed
- Pilot in command › Remedial action, delayed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
ACFT ENCOUNTERED DETERIORATING WEATHER ENROUTE FROM SHORE TO AN OIL RIG THAT WAS UNDER TOW IN THE GULF OF MEXICO. UPON ENCOUNTERING IMC CONDITIONS, THE PLT CLIMBED TO 600' AGL FOR BETTER OBSTACLE CLEARANCE AND TURNED BACK TOWARD THE BEACH. DURING A SUBSEQUENT ATTEMPT TO REACQUIRE VMC CONDITIONS THE PLT ENTERED A DESCENDING RIGHT TURN. THE PLT STATED THAT DURING THE TURN A RAPID DESCENT RATE DEVELOPED AND THAT HE WAS ABLE TO ARREST IT USING FULL COLLECTIVE, JUST PRIOR TO IMPACT WITH THE TIDAL MUD FLATS. THE ACFT EXPERIENCED A HARD LANDING WITH NO DAMAGE BUT WAS SUBSEQUENTLY DESTROYED DURING THE RECOVERY EFFORT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW86LRA07
- Event ID
- 20010110X00182
- Case number
- FTW86LRA07
- 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, damage. 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: 06a05e98e2bfef77f9163b1dcd5532ce367a1bb84a2745cf5404a01d3a6e05eb; retrieved 2026-09-18T20:09:17.672Z.