2019 Alta helicopter crash

On 31 August 2019, an Airbus AS350 helicopter operated by a contracted Helitrans pilot from Sweden crashed in the mountains of Skoddevarre in Alta Municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. The crash happened during a sightseeing tour, killing all six people on board. The tour was offered by a local music festival, Høstsprell, who had been providing the service for seven years. The helicopter, registered as LN‑OFU, had recently been delivered and had undergone security checks hours before takeoff.

An investigation by the Norwegian Safety Investigation Authority (NSIA) found no technical faults with the machinery, and concluded that LN‑OFU had entered servo transparency; the stresses on the rotors had exceeded the hydraulic servomotor's capacity, causing the controls to lock up. This was caused by the helicopter's heavy load and rapid fluctuations in velocity and height. The pilot tried to regain control, but was ultimately unable to do so and crashed into the terrain. As the aircraft did not have a crash-resistant fuel system (CRFS), the wreck promptly caught fire, destroying most of it and inflicting lethal burns to the people on board; autopsies of the victims' bodies suggested that they died from their burns. The NSIA consequently called for the ban of commercial flights on rotorcraft without CRFSs in the European Union. Airworthiness certificates in the European Union were amended in 2024 to require CRFSs on helicopters.

Helitrans received criticism for allowing an inexperienced pilot to fly with passengers, and for not having CRFSs installed on their helicopters. After the incident, they started replacing their fleet of aircraft with new ones installed with CRFSs. Both Høstsprell and Helitrans stopped providing sightseeing tours.

Background

Høstsprell, a music festival held in Kvenvik in Alta Municipality, had been arranging helicopter tours for attendees every year since 2012 for apiece. The company operating the tours, Helitrans, rented helicopters from Skjolden Cruisekai, who had acquired seven helicopters in June 2019 from Østnes Helicopters, the Norwegian representative for European aerospace manufacturer Airbus. Both Helitrans and Skjolden Cruisekai were owned in whole by Røysi Invest, an investment firm run by father-daughter pair Oddvar and Anne Line Røysi. Of their fleet of 25 helicopters, 15 were of the type Airbus AS350. Around 100 people were employed by Helitrans in 2019, one of whom was the Swedish pilot Fredrik Lindmark, who operated the flights in Kvenvik.

Fredrik Lindmark was a contract worker from Nyköping, Sweden, who lived with his partner and her son in Honningsvåg. He had worked with Helitrans as a loadmaster for two years since his first seasonal contract with them on 9 May 2017. His final contact with Helitrans was to last from 1 April to 30 November 2019. After having undergone an operator proficiency check on 26 August, he was now able to operate helicopters for them. 27 years old at the time of his death, he held a Swedish commercial flight certificate and a first-class medical certificate. He had obtained an AS350 rating from Airbus' facility in Marignane, France, in May 2018, where he scored a 96% on the knowledge test, and passed with full marks on the flight assessment. Airbus' training did not include supervised passenger flights. He underwent several successful proficiency checks, the last one performed in April 2019 by the Norwegian government. He had not undergone any training with a flight simulator. He was still in the process of gaining experience, having a combined flight time of 256 hours, 17 of which were conducted in AS350 type helicopters, and 50 hours in passenger flights. His employers at Helitrans viewed sightseeing tours as a less demanding task, therefore being fit for building the experience he lacked. Lindmark's coworkers described him as a thorough, structured, calm, and cautious individual, who was unlikely to invite danger by seeking thrills.

The helicopter operated by Lindmark, registered as LN‑OFU, was an AS350 with a flight time of 73 hours. It was ordered in September 2018 by Skjolden Cruisekai, and was delivered with an airworthiness certificate on 12 June 2019. Airbus had been working on crash-resistant fuel systems (CRFS) since 2011, which would be ready by 2014. They did not, however, make these obligatory in production until October 2019, and customers could therefore choose to leave them out. EU legislation from 2003 made it so any helicopter designs certified in or before 1994 did not require CRFSs. LN‑OFU did not have a CRFS, making it more vulnerable to catching fire in case of a crash. The installment of such a system would have cost €35.000. When questioned, CEO Oddvar Røysi denied that they left it out deliberately, noting that it was only considered "additional equipment" by the manufacturers.

Incident

On 31 August 2019, a 100-hour inspection of LN‑OFU was performed at 13:30, with no anomalies found, except a slight oil leak from the gasket of the gearbox's input shaft. At 16:05, the pilot and the loadmaster took off from Alta Airport to the festival grounds at Kvenvik, landing seven minutes later. At 16:40, the pilot gave his first sightseeing tour of the day for attendees of that year's Høstsprell in Kvenvik, which ended without incident at 16:50. At 16:59, he took off for another tour with five passengers in clear weather conditions. During the flight, the passengers sent media over Snapchat to acquaintances as they were heading toward the mountains of Skoddevarre. At 17:05, LN‑OFU disappeared from Helitrans' GSM network, and was last recorded by Flightradar24 as being stationary at the coordinates of the crash site at 17:08. Several witnesses reported seeing and hearing the helicopter, but no witnesses reported seeing the crash itself. LN‑OFU's loadmaster was notified of smoke coming from the mountains by a bystander, after which he started observing. Initially, he did not believe it to be from the aircraft, but after he was unable to hear any helicopter sounds, he contacted Helitrans' traffic centre, the police, the Joint Rescue Coordination Centre of Northern Norway (JRCC), and air traffic control at Alta Airport.

At 17:06, the JRCC received a report of the accident after the emergency position-indicating radiobeacon of the helicopter went off. Helitrans' traffic centre last received notice of LN‑OFU at 17:08, after which they started a rescue operation. At 17:16, another civilian Bell 205 helicopter operated by Heli‑Team came across the crashed helicopter by coincidence when returning from a transport order in the east to their base in Kvænangen Municipality. By the time they arrived, LN‑OFU had nearly burnt to a crisp. At 17:18 they started sending messages by radio, which were picked up by a Widerøe plane flying over. The crew of the plane started relaying information about the situation from Heli‑Team to the air traffic control tower at Alta Airport, including GPS-coordinates. The crew of the Heli‑Team spotted a survivor on the ground, around 50 meters (164 feet) from the crash site, after which they landed a safe distance away to try and assist him. After the loadmaster of the aircraft approached the survivor, they realised he was conscious and able to speak, but their conversation was not able to elucidate how the crash had happened. A Sea King rescue helicopter was sent from the military airbase at Banak at 17:20, and arrived at the scene of the crash at 17:50. Four of the victims were declared dead by the JRCC at 18:17, with one victim still missing, and one being treated by rescuers. The victim being treated was flown to the University Hospital of North Norway, where they died overnight. The missing person was found dead at 20:40. The entirety of the helicopter's airframe except the tail was destroyed by the fire, including all electronic devices on board, and it lit the terrain c. 50 m2 (538.2 ft2) around it on fire.