WPR19LA205 · Md Helicopter 369 E
Lane County Sheriffs Office Md Helicopter 369 E · Accident: loss of tail rotor effectiveness on approach
From Eugene Airport (EUG) to Eugene Airport (EUG)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR19LA205
- 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
Md Helicopter 369 E
- Aircraft type
- MD Helicopters 369
- 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
- N438RC
- Operator
- Lane County Sheriffs Office
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Eugene Airport (EUG), Eugene, ORTo Eugene Airport (EUG), Eugene, OR
- Aircraft age
- About 32 years (built 1987)
- 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
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilots reported that they were approaching the airport ramp area for landing from the east with a wind of 10 knots from the north. About 25 to 30 feet above the ramp at an airspeed of about 25 knots, the left seat pilot reduced left pedal pressure to turn the helicopter toward the right into the wind, then subsequently increased left pedal pressure to stop the turn; however, the helicopter continued right and began to spin. The pilot lowered the collective, and the right seat pilot took the flight controls in an attempt to slow the spin. The helicopter impacted the ground hard, spreading the landing skids and resulting in the tail rotor contacting the ramp. Postaccident examination of the airframe and engine did not reveal any anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. The helicopter’s altitude above the ramp, its low forward speed, and the right turn were conducive to the onset of a loss of tail rotor effectiveness (LTE). Given the lack of mechanical anomalies, it is likely that the loss of control was due to LTE.
Probable cause
The left seat pilot’s failure to account for environmental conditions conducive to a loss of tail rotor effectiveness, which resulted in a loss of tail rotor effectiveness and subsequent loss of control.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR19LA205
- Event ID
- 20190730X15341
- Case number
- WPR19LA205
- 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: local date, investigation status, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2019-07-28.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 301680e67dea5a70e52c4d6ad3ebfa386872c8f75e8dc8cf0e6b34bf9c44e329; retrieved 2026-09-16T09:36:25.611Z.