CEN13LA442 · Texas Helicopter Corp OH-13H/M74A
Hendrickson Flying Service Texas Helicopter Corp OH-13H/M74A · Accident: controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT) while maneuvering
From Toluca, IL (private airstrip) to Toluca, IL (private airstrip)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN13LA442
- 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
Texas Helicopter Corp OH-13H/M74A
- Aircraft type
- Texas OH-13
- 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
- N10009
- Operator
- Hendrickson Flying Service
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Toluca, IL (private airstrip)To Toluca, IL (private airstrip)
- 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
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Psychological
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he was applying agricultural product to a "J" shaped field. After he completed the aerial application to the "long" portion of the field, the pilot turned south to finish the "small' portion of the field. He stated that he checked the helicopter's light bar, which is often used by pilots as a navigation aid to fly on an indicated swath path. The pilot then "saw corn in the windshield," and the helicopter rolled upside down and subsequently came to rest on its left side. No mechanical malfunctions or anomalies that would have precluded normal operation were detected during the helicopter's postaccident examination.
Probable cause
The pilot's diverted attention during an agricultural application maneuver, which resulted in the helicopter impacting a corn field.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN13LA442
- Event ID
- 20130729X04550
- Case number
- CEN13LA442
- 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. 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: ac166183786e7b0baaa1a14a3f487ff85ddf0a722b555f8ee5dc9e762f88742a; retrieved 2026-09-15T22:21:08.407Z.