LAX06CA180 · Bell 47-G5
Bell 47-G5 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) while maneuvering
From Soledad, CA to Salmina Ranch, CA
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX06CA180
- 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 47-G5
- 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
- N4741R
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Soledad, CATo Salmina Ranch, CA
- 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 137: Agricultural
- 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 · aerial application
- 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
- Total loss of engine power (non-mechanical)
- 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
- Fuel exhaustion
- 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
- Fluid, fuel › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Fuel consumption calculations, inaccurate
- Pilot in command › Refueling, not performed
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 crashed in a field following a loss of engine power due to fuel exhaustion. The pilot performed a preflight and checked the fuel quantity prior to departure. The level in the tank was approximately 1 inch below the cap. The pilot left the operator's facility approximately 0525. From 0525 to 0715 he sprayed 14 loads on various fields, totaling approximately 99 minutes of flight. As the pilot was flying to his next job, the engine lost power, about 0720. At this point, the helicopter's fuel gauges read about 1/4 full and he assumed that he had 10-15 minutes of fuel remaining. When the engine lost power he lowered the collective and turned into the wind, then the helicopter impacted the ground. The pilot stated that the helicopter and engine had no mechanical failures or malfunctions during the flight. The operator said the helicopter has an engine that burns about 16 gallons of fuel per hour. It also has a capacity of 28 gallons of usable fuel, which equates to approximately 105 minutes of fuel. According to the pilot's statement he flew about 99 minutes. The operator said that with the fuel down about an inch when the pilot started, fuel exhaustion was inevitable. The pilot was instructed to refuel every hour or every 10 loads. Each load takes approximately 6 minutes.
Probable cause
fuel exhaustion due to the pilot's inaccurate fuel consumption calculations and failure to refuel the helicopter which resulted in a loss of engine power.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX06CA180
- Event ID
- 20060708X00902
- Case number
- LAX06CA180
- 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: cbf54d32e689a831a2f2f621a5ce573cae08e9f510964d11592c1ff90bec0af7; retrieved 2026-09-22T04:53:56.994Z.