ERA15LA376 · Hughes 269 B
Hughes 269 B · Accident: loss of tail rotor effectiveness on approach
From Leesburg International Airport (LEE) to Eustis, FL
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA15LA376
- 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
Hughes 269 B
- Aircraft type
- Hughes 269
- 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
- N9567F
- Operator
- Rentoumis Michael G
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Leesburg International Airport (LEE), Leesburg, FLTo Eustis, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 43 years (built 1972)
- 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
- 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
- Loss of tail rotor effectiveness
- 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 › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The commercial pilot was flying the helicopter about 600 ft above ground level and at a speed of 60 to 70 mph and began descending and slowing the helicopter as it approached a friend's home, where he planned to land. The right-seat passenger, who was a student pilot, reported that the helicopter got "low and slow" during the approach and began "violently spinning to the right." The student pilot also reported that the wind was light and variable and that there were no mechanical malfunctions or failures during the flight. Postaccident examination of the wreckage revealed no evidence of a mechanical malfunction or anomaly.
A cell phone video provided by a witness confirmed the student's report that the helicopter was at a low altitude and airspeed when it yawed right, then spun right, and descended to ground impact. The engine could be heard running throughout the accident sequence.
It is likely that, during the landing approach, the helicopter's airspeed dropped below effective translational lift, and when the pilot added power to compensate, the helicopter yawed right. The pilot was unable to stop the yaw and lost control of the helicopter due to a loss of tail rotor effectiveness.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain yaw control as he slowed the helicopter during a landing approach, which resulted in a loss of helicopter control due to a loss of tail rotor effectiveness.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA15LA376
- Event ID
- 20150925X54046
- Case number
- ERA15LA376
- 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: a5d0750dd7845c4fed5b77e155eb7fce5ef8c8ce2bd3fa40a3f2e1d3949e93ce; retrieved 2026-09-16T02:49:35.853Z.