ANC06LA025 · Robinson R44
Robinson R44 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather while maneuvering
From Iliamna Airport (ILI) to Iliamna Airport (ILI)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC06LA025
- 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
- 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
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
- N7528Z
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Iliamna Airport (ILI), ILIAMNA, AKTo Iliamna Airport (ILI), Ilimana, AK
- 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
- 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, continued
- Pilot in command › Spatial disorientation
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 helicopter pilot was flying one passenger on an on-demand, Title 14, CFR Part 135 air taxi flight to a remote site in an area surrounded by snow-covered, flat, featureless terrain. Low fog, reduced visibility, and flat light conditions reduced his ability to discern a horizon or terrain. He said that the visibility deteriorated to about 1 or 2 miles, and he was unable to discern any topographic features on the snow-covered terrain, and he elected to make a precautionary landing to wait for better visibility. After about 10 minutes, he decided to continue to his destination. Just after takeoff, flat light conditions again reduced his ability to recognize any topographical features on the snow-covered terrain. He reported that while he was attempting to establish a stable hover, and erroneously believing that the helicopter was not moving, the helicopter's right skid struck the snow-covered terrain. The helicopter rolled to the right, and the main rotor blades struck the ground. As the main rotor blades struck the ground, the helicopter rolled onto its right side. The helicopter sustained substantial damage to the fuselage, tail boom assembly, and the main and tail rotor drive systems. The pilot reported that there were no preaccident mechanical anomalies with the helicopter.
Probable cause
The pilot's continued flight into adverse weather conditions, and his spatial disorientation and loss of control during a subsequent landing attempt. Factors associated with the accident are flat light and whiteout conditions, fog, and snow-covered terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC06LA025
- Event ID
- 20060314X00302
- Case number
- ANC06LA025
- 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, coordinates. 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: 62106604e713f0604fa53db27ad218d37393e5aa50fb1350636c0f1bdb19d8b0; retrieved 2026-09-18T14:54:51.767Z.