LAX08CA138 · Schweizer 300C
High Desert Helicopters Schweizer 300C · Accident: collision with terrain/object (non-CFIT) on approach
From Ogden Hinckley Airport (KOGD) to Ogden Hinckley Airport (KOGD)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX08CA138
- 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
Schweizer 300C
- Aircraft type
- Schweizer 300
- 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
- N1510A
- Operator
- High Desert Helicopters
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ogden Hinckley Airport (KOGD), Ogden, UTTo Ogden Hinckley Airport (KOGD)
- 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
- Approach · VFR go-around
- 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
- Collision with terrain/object (non-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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Psychological
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The instructor pilot and the private pilot under instruction arrived at the location where they were going to practice pinnacle approaches and landings. They reconnoitered the area at 300 feet above ground level (agl) in preparation for landing. They performed a power check at 500 feet agl, and concluded that engine power was sufficient to maintain an out of ground effect hover. The student began the approach at 350 feet agl. The helicopter's rate of descent was 500 feet per minute (fpm) at 25 knots of airspeed. Settling with power (vortex ring state) can be encountered when rates of descent are greater than 300 feet per minute and airspeed below that of translational lift. The helicopter began to overshoot the point of intended landing, and the approach became almost vertical. At 30 feet agl, the helicopter's descent rate increased and the student aborted the approach and began a go-around. The instructor realized that rotor revolutions-per-minute (rpm) had degraded below the normal range, so he took the control of the helicopter. Because the go-around had been initiated, the helicopter was moving forward slowly over a descending slope and the instructor was not able to land the helicopter. He attempted to gain power by lowering and raising collective; however, the helicopter's skid contacted the ground and the helicopter rolled over.
Probable cause
The pilot under instruction's encounter with a settling with power condition, and the flight instructor's failure to maintain adequate rotor rpm during the subsequent go-around. Also causal was the instructor pilot's delayed remedial action during the approach sequence and his inadequate supervision of the flight.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX08CA138
- Event ID
- 20080627X00938
- Case number
- LAX08CA138
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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: 8db7c091a9662ace743e62221681f4d876f804c7f0514490228268608f318f34; retrieved 2026-09-15T09:49:46.303Z.