SEA08LA043 · Bell UH-1B
Bell UH-1B · Accident: loss of control in flight during takeoff
From Ennis, MT to Ennis, MT
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA08LA043
- 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 UH-1B
- 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
- N46969
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ennis, MTTo Ennis, MT
- 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
- Takeoff · rejected takeoff
- 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 control in flight
- 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
- Control friction › Diminished
- Terrain condition › Snow covered
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he had flown the helicopter for five cycles throughout the day and landed at the landing zone to remove the long line. He was asked by ground personnel to reposition the helicopter from the landing zone to a nearby road in order for a snowplow to access the landing zone. Once the snowplow was done, the pilot began to reposition the helicopter back to the landing zone. As the helicopter lifted from the ground, it began to vibrate, and the vibration turned into a severe "hop or a bounce." The pilot lifted the helicopter to 15 feet; however, it continued to vibrate and subsequently began to nose over and become uncontrollable The pilot then decided to force land the helicopter and touched down hard in two feet of snow, substantially damaging the doorframe. Inspection of the helicopter revealed that the collective control absolute friction was less than the manufacturer's specified setting and the maintenance manual indicated that if the friction is not set properly, a collective bounce could be induced. No other mechanical anomalies were identified and the reason for the loss of friction could not be determined. The operator's manual indicates that the severity of this oscillation is such that effective control of the helicopter may become difficult to maintain.
Probable cause
The loss of collective control friction during takeoff that resulted in a collective bounce oscillation. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's failure to maintain aircraft control during the aborted takeoff and the snow covered terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA08LA043
- Event ID
- 20071219X01973
- Case number
- SEA08LA043
- 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: c692227b0bf187a87af48c57a76a0a4bbd6bb11e3ffc5c853b9b66bcfb7ab84f; retrieved 2026-09-22T03:14:54.296Z.