1991 Vallejo helicopter crash
Corporate Mobility Bell 206B · Continued flight into known adverse weather
From Concord, CA to O56 · Novato, CA
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX92LA029
- 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
- Unknown
- Event fatalities
- 3 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- Occupants
- Unknown
- Survivors
- 0
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 0 serious · 0 minor (NTSB)
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Bell 206B
- Aircraft type
- Bell 206
- 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
- N3456M
- Operator
- Corporate Mobility
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Concord, CATo O56 · Novato, CA
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- 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
- En route · cruise
- First occurrenceThe 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
- In flight collision with object
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Electrical tower; Visual flight rules (VFR) flight into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Altitude, improper
- Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, intentional
- Pilot in command › VFR flight into imc, continued
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
From the Wikipedia article
On October 25, 1991, a Bell 206 carrying rock music concert promoter Bill Graham, his girlfriend Melissa Gold, and pilot Steve Kahn crashed into a transmission tower west of Vallejo, California, killing everyone on board. The cause of the accident was determined to be the pilot's intentional flight into known adverse weather conditions.
Accident
The Bell 206B JetRanger was operating under Federal Aviation Regulation Part 91, and departed from parking lot "F" of the Concord Pavilion around 9:45 pm, bound for the Commodore Center Heliport (KJMC) in Sausalito, California, about 27 miles to the west-southwest. The pilot had received a weather briefing in which visual flight rules (VFR) flight was not recommended due to inclement weather. Before take-off, the pilot requested and received a special VFR clearance to pass through the airspace of Buchanan Field Airport in Concord, California, on a northwest heading. When the helicopter lifted off, the weather was 0.5 mi visibility, gusty winds, heavy rain, and overcast with a 200 ft ceiling. Using pilotage to navigate from one landmark to another at an altitude just below the cloud base, the pilot proceeded through the city of Vallejo and began following California State Route 37. At 9:56 pm near the northernmost point of San Pablo Bay, the Bell 206B struck the top of a 223 foot high-voltage transmission tower, located roughly 150 feet south of CA 37, and became impaled on it. The aircraft exploded on impact and all three occupants suffered fatal injuries.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
The aircraft had to be left hanging from the tower until investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) could examine it.
The inquiry found the pilot had considerable geographic knowledge of the area and decided to fly VFR when conditions would indicate use of instrument flight rules (IFR). Witnesses saw the helicopter flying parallel to CA 37 at about 200 ft altitude above ground level and then explode as it collided with the tower. The area sectional chart clearly showed the location and height of the high-voltage tower.
The NTSB's final conclusion was: "The pilot's intentional flight into known adverse weather, continued flight into instrument meteorological conditions, and improper altitude. Contributing to the accident were low ceilings, poor visibility, and restricted visual lookout."
Text from the Wikipedia article “1991 Vallejo helicopter crash” (revision 1357503961, retrieved 2026-09-18) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out. Read the article
NTSB narrative
THE CERTIFICATED AIRLINE PILOT AND TWO PASSENGERS DEPARTED IN A HELICOPTER FOR THE PLANNED DESTINATION AIRPORT, LOCATED ABOUT 27 MILES NORTHWEST OF THE DEPARTURE POINT. THE PILOT RECEIVED A WEATHER BRIEFING IN WHICH VFR FLIGHT WAS NOT RECOMMENDED DUE TO LOW CEILINGS AND LOW VISIBILITY. THE PILOT WAS FAMILIAR WITH THE GEOGRAPHIC AREA. THE PILOT RECEIVED A SPECIAL VFR CLEARANCE THROUGH AN AIRPORT TRAFFIC AREA, DEPARTING TO THE NORTHWEST. ABOUT 20 MILES FROM THE DEPARTURE POINT, WITNESSES OBSERVED THE HELICOPTER PARALLELING A HIGHWAY AT ABOUT 200 FEET ABOVE THE GROUND. THE WEATHER WAS REPORTED TO BE A 200 FOOT OVERCAST CEILING, GUSTY WINDS, HEAVY RAIN, AND VISIBILITY OF ABOUT 1/2 MILE. THE WITNESSES OBSERVED THE HELICOPTER STRIKE THE TOP OF A 223 FOOT HIGH TRANSMISSION TOWER AND EXPLODE. THE LOCATION OF THE TRANSMISSION LINE WAS MARKED ON THE AREA SECTIONAL CHART.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S INTENTIONAL FLIGHT INTO KNOWN ADVERSE WEATHER, CONTINUED FLIGHT INTO INSTRUMENT METEOROLOGICAL CONDITIONS, AND IMPROPER ALTITUDE. CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT WAS LOW CEILINGS, POOR VISIBILITY, AND RESTRICTED VISUAL LOOKOUT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
Wikipedia article: 1991 Vallejo helicopter crash
- Revision
- 1357503961 · 2026-06-03 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q20313323
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record LAX92LA029
- Event ID
- 20001212X18336
- Case number
- LAX92LA029
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "1991 Vallejo helicopter crash" (page 46630313, revision 1357503961); merged with NTSB case LAX92LA029 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date (local date; NTSB record LAX92LA029 stores the UTC date 1991-10-26)
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record LAX92LA029
- Map position
- NTSB record LAX92LA029: events decimal coordinates
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record LAX92LA029: aircraft; gaps from Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- NTSB record LAX92LA029: operated under Part 91: General Aviation
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities (the NTSB record states no total)
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record LAX92LA029: events.inj_f_grnd
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (2)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "1991 Vallejo helicopter crash" and NTSB case LAX92LA029, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this US event the NTSB's values are used where the two differ; each value names its source.
- The NTSB record dates it 1991-10-26, the UTC date it stores; the local date, 1991-10-25, is the Wikipedia article's and is used.