ERA20LA273 · Eurocopter EC130 B4
Eurocopter EC130 B4 · Accident: settling with power/vortex ring state on approach
From McGhee Tyson Airport (TYS) to Knoxville, TN
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA20LA273
- 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
- 1 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- 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
Eurocopter EC130 B4
- Aircraft type
- Eurocopter EC130
- 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
- N55GJ
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From McGhee Tyson Airport (TYS), Knoxville, TNTo Knoxville, TN
- Aircraft age
- About 17 years (built 2003)
- 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
- Settling with power/vortex ring state
- 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 › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The helicopter pilot was returning to his property located adjacent to a river. As the helicopter descended toward the water at a 25° angle with low forward airspeed, the pilot applied power to arrest the descent. However, the helicopter continued to descend until it impacted the river short of the intended landing area. The pilot and two passengers survived the impact and a third passenger drowned. The investigation revealed no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or anomalies that would have prevented the normal operation of the helicopter. Recovered flight data indicated the engine was producing power at the time of impact. Weather reports and statements from the pilot and witnesses indicated that the helicopter descended steeply with little forward airspeed and a tailwind of about 5 knots, which is a flight profile conducive to vortex ring state. The pilot’s reported lack of collective authority when increasing power to arrest the helicopter’s descent is also consistent with the helicopter entering vortex ring state. A pilot's failure to monitor altitude, airspeed, and rate of descent during an approach can result in a flight profile conducive to vortex ring state.
Probable cause
The pilot's entry into vortex ring state and his inability to arrest the helicopter's descent while maneuvering for landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA20LA273
- Event ID
- 20200803X11310
- Case number
- ERA20LA273
- 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, cause areas. 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: c9a56af533920341a1c040b880ba237ad32c95ccd300ebc7fb87bc08906a3ece; retrieved 2026-09-15T07:18:01.067Z.