MIA06FA039 · Robinson R44
Robinson R44 · Accident: in flight collision with object en route
From Grand Ridge, FL to North Palm Beach County General Aviation Airport (F45)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA06FA039
- 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
- 3 · 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Robinson R44
- Aircraft type
- Robinson R44
- 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
- N442DH
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Grand Ridge, FLTo North Palm Beach County General Aviation Airport (F45), North Palm Ba., FL
- 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
- In flight collision with object
- 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
- Tree(s)
- 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
- Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, continued
- Pilot in command › Impairment(drugs)
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The commercial pilot was ferrying a helicopter with two passengers/friends under Title 14, CFR Part 91 when the helicopter collided with trees and terrain in a wooded area at night, in instrument meteorological conditions. Witnesses related that the helicopter had landed near a hotel and truck stop, and the pilot and passengers had inquired about renting rooms. The pilot and passengers elected not to rent rooms, but walked to the truck stop and had a meal. After the meal, the helicopter was seen departing to the south. The helicopter did not arrive at its destination, and a search was initiated. A witness in a car on a nearby freeway, about 6 miles from the truck stop, reported to the local sheriff's office three days after the accident, that he had seen an explosion south of the freeway the night of the accident. Searchers located the helicopter in thick woods, in trees about 60 feet tall. The wreckage was extensively fragmented, consistent with a high speed impact with the trees. An on-site examination of the helicopter disclosed no evidence of any preimpact mechanical anomalies. Weather in the vicinity at the time of the accident was reported as 300 feet overcast, visibility 1.75 miles in mist, with thunderstorms nearby. The pilot did not have an instrument rating, and the helicopter was not equipped with instrumentation for flight into instrument meteorological conditions. Toxicological samples from the pilot disclosed extremely high levels of methamphetamine. Methamphetamine is a rarely prescribed drug, and its use is not approved for pilots. Methamphetamine is highly addictive, and is most widely used as an illegal recreational drug. The amount of methamphetamine in the pilot's system was approximately 50 times higher than expected from a single dose of a prescription drug. Use of methamphetamine can result in marked personality changes, psychosis, irrational and impulsive behavior, irritability, hyperactivity, and other symptoms.
Probable cause
The pilot's continued flight into known adverse weather, and his impairment, which resulted in an in-flight collision with trees and terrain during cruise flight.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA06FA039
- Event ID
- 20060111X00044
- Case number
- MIA06FA039
- 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 2006-01-02.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 5b06c7802f5e7a2f8a051bc6b565e3ea01f709af55fc0f8202f039ecc84085d5; retrieved 2026-09-20T17:38:24.557Z.