GAA20CA063 · Sikorsky S 58JT ET
Midwest Helicopter Airways Sikorsky S 58JT ET · Accident: low altitude operation/event while maneuvering
From Indianapolis Metropolitan Airport (UMP) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- GAA20CA063
- 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
Sikorsky S 58JT ET
- Aircraft type
- Sikorsky S-58
- 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
- N827MW
- Operator
- Midwest Helicopter Airways
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Indianapolis Metropolitan Airport (UMP), Indianapolis, INTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 61 years (built 1958)
- 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
- Maneuvering · hover
- 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
- Low altitude operation/event
- 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
- Environmental issues › Physical environment
- 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 pilot reported that he conducted a low-reconnaissance flight in the helicopter over the intended landing site, which was just east of a building. Shortly after, he realized that the landing site had changed to west of the building. He maneuvered the helicopter to a hover over the new landing site about 75 ft above ground level and started a vertical descent. During the descent, a company mechanic seated in the left seat told the pilot of an obstacle left of the helicopter. He acknowledged seeing the obstacle and continued to descend. Shortly after touchdown, as the pilot reduced the throttle setting to idle, the main rotor blades struck a tractor trailer, the helicopter yawed, and the tail rotor blades struck the trailer. The helicopter sustained substantial damage to the main rotor and tail rotor systems. The director of operations reported that there were no preaccident mechanical failures or malfunctions with the helicopter that would have precluded normal operation.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain proper clearance from a tractor trailer during landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record GAA20CA063
- Event ID
- 20191111X91036
- Case number
- GAA20CA063
- 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: 1077161e1012c739d55d0d44b50c28c0b871b49e0ef67d37dcd1744f849ba6ad; retrieved 2026-09-16T10:36:26.772Z.