New York Airways Flight 600
Vertol 107-II · Loss of control after fatigue fracture in the main rotor
From John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) to Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR)
Event
- 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
- 6 · 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
- Airline
- 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
Vertol 107-II
- Aircraft type
- Vertol 107
- 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
- N6673D
- Operator
- New York Airways
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)To Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR)
- 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 121: Air carrier (scheduled domestic passenger service)
- 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
- Takeoff
- 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
- Main rotor failure
- 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
- Miscellaneous acts, conditions › Fatigue fracture
- Miscellaneous acts, conditions › Lack of lubrication-specific part, not system
- Miscellaneous acts, conditions › Oil contamination
- Rotorcraft › Main rotor drive shaft
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Jamaica, NY, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
From the Wikipedia article
New York Airways Flight 600 (flight number: NY600, callsign NEW YORK 600) was a regional domestic scheduled flight of New York Airways from the Pan Am Building Heliport in New York City to New York Idlewild Airport in New York City. On 14 October 1963, a Boeing-Vertol 107-II helicopter crashed on this flight after the main rotor broke due to material fatigue shortly after takeoff. All six occupants of the helicopter were killed in the accident.
Accident sequence
The helicopter, whose departure was scheduled for 12:30, took off at 12:33 from New York Idlewild International Airport. Ten seconds after takeoff, air traffic control received an unintelligible rattling noise over the radio. The air traffic controller watched as a rotor blade came off and the helicopter fell tail-first to the ground from a height of about 150 feet at a roll angle of 45 degrees and broke apart. All six occupants died in the impact and the ensuing fire.
Investigation and cause
Cause
The Civil Aeronautics Board took over the investigation into the cause of the accident. The investigators concluded that the accident was attributable to a fatigue fracture in the mechanical shaft that transmits torque from the transfer gearbox to the aft main gearbox. The material failure was said to have been attributable to contamination of the hydraulic system with water residues. Metal chips were found in the gearbox oil that clogged two oil injection nozzles leading to the affected shaft. From this the investigators were able to conclude that the material failure had occurred due to insufficient lubrication.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the German Wikipedia article “New-York-Airways-Flug 600” (revision 252302226, retrieved 2026-09-19) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out; the translation may contain errors, and long articles were cut to their first 700 words. Read the article
NTSB remarks
FATIGUE FAILURE OF DRIVE QUILL SHAFT DUE CONTAMINATION OF LUBE SYSTEM IN AFT TRANSMISSION ASSY.
NTSB's remark from its 1962–1981 archive, as recorded (abbreviated, at most 98 characters): the archive has no narrative
Sources
German Wikipedia article: New-York-Airways-Flug 600
- Article
- New-York-Airways-Flug 600
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 252302226 · 2025-01-16 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q111706469
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record
- Event ID
- 19631014P000082
- Case number
- Unknown
- Dataset
- historical-pre1982
- Source SHA-256
- abe1a933b4b73583d61684309f7f0610c281e3c1de3537c6471bf2a98ba6481d
Where each value comes from
- Record
- de Wikipedia article "New-York-Airways-Flug 600" (page 12046060, revision 252302226), translated into English with AI assistance; merged with NTSB case NTSB19631014P000082 (PRE1982 tblFirstHalf (one row per aircraft, grouped by date, place and time))
- Date
- NTSB record NTSB19631014P000082: PRE1982 DATE_OCCURRENCE
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record NTSB19631014P000082
- Map position
- NTSB record NTSB19631014P000082: centre of the town the record names (GeoNames, CC BY 4.0)
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record NTSB19631014P000082: PRE1982 REGIST_NO, ACFT_MAKE, ACFT_MODEL; gaps from Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- NTSB record NTSB19631014P000082: operated under Part 121: Air carrier (scheduled domestic passg.svc)
- Fatalities
- NTSB record NTSB19631014P000082: PRE1982 TOTAL_ABRD_FATAL of each aircraft, plus people on the ground and others outside the aircraft
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record NTSB19631014P000082: events.inj_f_grnd
- Summary
- Wikipedia article lead
Source notes (4)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "New York Airways Flight 600" and NTSB case NTSB19631014P000082, 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.
- From NTSB's 1962-1981 archive (PRE1982), which holds at most a short remark (98 characters, abbreviated) instead of a narrative; the accident type, phase of flight, causes and conditions are NTSB's codes, decoded as the archive defines them.
- Reviewed means this record passed the site's consistency check, not that it was checked against a narrative or report - there is none to check against.
- The operation category is mapped from the archive's operator and operation codes and has not been reviewed.