SEA07TA202 · Bell UH-1H
United States Forest Service Bell UH-1H · Accident: controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT) during initial climb
From Benchmark, MT to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA07TA202
- 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
- Government
- 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 UH-1H
- Aircraft type
- Bell UH-1
- 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
- N667HP
- Operator
- United States Forest Service
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Benchmark, MTTo 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
- Public Aircraft
- 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
- Initial climb
- Defining eventThe 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
- Controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT)
- 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
- Weather condition › Haze/smoke
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The purpose of the flight was to carry an external load in support of firefighting activity. The pilot departed from a nearby helibase with a visibility of 5 miles under moderate smoky conditions. While en route to another landing zone, the visibility deteriorated and the pilot reported difficulty seeing the landing zone. The pilot successfully landed at the landing zone without incident and set down a load of supplies. The ground crew then attached a load of firefighting equipment that was to be returned to the helibase. As the pilot transitioned to forward flight to depart from the landing zone, the visibility dropped, and he reportedly lost all visual reference. The helicopter settled into trees and impacted the ground, coming to rest on its right side. In the area of the landing zone at the time of the accident, the visibility was reported to be fluctuating between 1/4 to 1 mile due to smoke.
Probable cause
Dense smoke/haze which restricted the pilot's visibility and the pilot's failure to maintain aircraft control during the emergency descent resulting in impact with terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA07TA202
- Event ID
- 20070720X00969
- Case number
- SEA07TA202
- 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: b0b59f47c4e253ddec5014350c6861aff2e39999bd26e2a7263c81c557f53de9; retrieved 2026-09-18T21:13:55.150Z.