CHI03LA184 · Bell 47G-5A
Bell 47G-5A · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Sandusky, MI (private airstrip) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI03LA184
- 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
- Unknown
- 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
Bell 47G-5A
- Aircraft type
- Bell 47
- 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
- N8413D
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sandusky, MI (private airstrip)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
- Loss of engine power
- 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
- Ignition system, ignition switch › Failure
- Pilot in command › Flare, high
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The helicopter sustained substantial damage when it landed hard during an autorotation following an in-flight loss of engine power. The pilot reported the engine failed at approximately 400 feet above ground level while in cruise flight. The pilot noted he performed an autorotation but flared early to avoid a drainage ditch. The pilot stated the helicopter landed hard in a field. An inspection of the helicopter showed engine and flight control continuity. The spark plugs and exhaust tubes were clean and the fuel tanks contained fuel. The magnetos worked when tested independently of the ignition system. The inspection revealed that the ignition switch had an internal fault causing it to ground out the ignition system.
Probable cause
The failure of the ignition switch leading to an engine power loss in cruise flight and the subsequent high flare during autorotation. Factors contributing to the accident were the pilot's misjudgment of the landing flare and the unsuitable terrain encountered by the pilot on landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI03LA184
- Event ID
- 20030701X00984
- Case number
- CHI03LA184
- 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: local date, investigation status, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2003-06-28.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 0915af84abbe1a29dc9072414038e77b9f7e84c01a14a2ed47d970accd37989a; retrieved 2026-09-22T09:05:23.565Z.