ERA20LA216 · Bell 47G 3B1
A&F Aviation Services Bell 47G 3B1 · Accident: loss of engine power (total) while maneuvering
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA20LA216
- 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
Bell 47G 3B1
- Aircraft type
- Bell 47
- 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
- N473TT
- Operator
- A&F Aviation Services
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 52 years (built 1968)
- 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
- 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 engine power (total)
- 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 power plant
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot had conducted eight brief (7- to 8-minute) nonrevenue passenger flights uneventfully on the day of the accident. The helicopter was fueled before the eighth flight. During the ninth flight, the helicopter’s engine lost total power when the helicopter was about 1.5 miles north of the heliport and was descending through an altitude of 900 ft mean sea level. The pilot executed an autorotation and landed in a field. On touchdown, the main rotor blade struck the tailboom.
Postaccident examination of the airframe and engine revealed no evidence of any preimpact malfunctions except for the fuel line to the carburetor, which had collapsed. A borsescope inspection revealed that light could not be observed through the fuel line. The borescope was then pushed through the fuel line, and no contaminates were found. A subsequent metallurgical examination of the fuel line revealed no blockages; no damage to the interior of the hose; and no evidence of kinks, creases, or material creep. The blocked fuel line likely resulted in the loss of engine power; however, the reason for the blockage could not be determined.
Probable cause
A total loss of engine power due to a blocked fuel line; the reason for the blockage could not be determined based on the available evidence.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA20LA216
- Event ID
- 20200615X01458
- Case number
- ERA20LA216
- 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, cause areas. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2020-06-15.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 062ef06d26e3a0cb3c338f184b381e4e643773a6a60371fddec13e5bc1a70f89; retrieved 2026-09-16T11:51:12.264Z.