Posted on: Saturday, October 30, 2004
Pilot error cited in crash
By Christie Wilson
Neighbor Island Editor
The National Transportation Safety Board said pilot error was responsible for the rollover of helicopter on a mountain ridge above Wahiawa on Oct. 29, 2002.
The incident took place on the Schofield Barracks Military Reservation and involved a Cherry Helicopters' Hughes 369D helicopter, which had been hired to ferry three of the Army's civilian environmental specialists to a remote area to conduct routine monitoring of endangered species.
The 57-year-old pilot had set down on an 18-foot-wide landing site of soft soil that sloped to the right, according to an NTSB report issued Thursday. With the rotor still spinning at flight speed, the passenger sitting directly behind the pilot got out of the aircraft, leaving the other two passengers on the right side of the helicopter. During an attempted takeoff from the ridge, the helicopter began rolling to the right and the pilot was not able to recover, the report said. The aircraft tipped over and slid about 150 feet down the mountainside.
The pilot and one of the passengers suffered serious injuries, and the helicopter was destroyed, the report said.
The NTSB determined the probable cause of the incident to be from the combined effects of soft, sloping terrain and the pilot's failure to redistribute the passengers so that the weight of the aircraft was more balanced.
Pilot error also was to blame in an incident this past Aug. 13 involving a Cessna 172S that veered off the runway at Honolulu International Airport.
A separate NTSB report released Thursday said a Flight School Hawai'i student pilot was the sole occupant of the aircraft, which had taken off from Kalaeloa. The Cessna hit the runway hard and bounced several times, causing the nose gear to collapse. The plane veered to the right, coming to rest on a grass median.
The airplane sustained substantial damage but the 81-year-old pilot was not injured.
In both cases, the NTSB reports did not name the pilots.
Reach Christie Wilson at cwilson@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 244-4880.
