Vanderbilt Lifeflight Airbus Helicopter Fatal, 11/8/25

[donjohnston]

When responding to a question, is it necessary to be a jerk?

I'll take that as a "yes".

 

[Doc Holliday]

I'll take that as a "yes".

 

[AV8R_87]

Not sure you would find it there as there was no damage and no injuries. While the pilot did suffer some incapacitation he was able on the landing to get it down with help.

See Lindberg's post below. So now you're telling me that something that is reportable to the NTSB wasn't reported?
Weren't you having a meltdown when I misread the rule and (based on almost no such reports being available) drew the conclusion that maybe not all of them get reported (to the NTSB)?

§ 830.5 Immediate notification.
The operator of any civil aircraft, or any public aircraft not operated by the Armed Forces or an intelligence agency of the United States, or any foreign aircraft shall immediately, and by the most expeditious means available, notify the nearest National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) office, 1 when:

(a) An aircraft accident or any of the following listed serious incidents occur:

. . .

(2) Inability of any required flight crewmember to perform normal flight duties as a result of injury or illness;

You’re the one using the word “drop”. That was never implied.

See your own words below. While I condensed your statement to a single word, anyone with a modest comprehension of English will agree that both statements are similar in action.
But feel free to educate us in how your statement is so vastly different than the way I condensed it.

It is teaching them that below 44 kts to push down to a hard landing

What you don’t seem to understand is how helicopter controls actually work.

You really love throwing insults around, buddy. Does it make you feel better about yourself? Some people were nice enough to tug on your sleeve and remind you to behave, all you did was double down on your behavior. And not just in this thread.
Your behavior reminds me of Marvin Falitz, captain of Northwest Airlink Flight 5719.

 

[Doc Holliday]

See Lindberg's post below. So now you're telling me that something that is reportable to the NTSB wasn't reported?
Weren't you having a meltdown when I misread the rule and (based on almost no such reports being available) drew the conclusion that maybe not all of them get reported (to the NTSB)?

Meltdown? Seriously?

IIRC the Air Evac incident happened in the January 2018. It was immediately reported to the CMT of the FAA who investigated. It was considered a partial incapacitation as the pilot did regain enough consciousness before touchdown on the runway to get the helicopter on the ground without damage.

It was reported through VDRP or ASAP IIRC.

Here's an article discussing it: https://verticalmag.com/features/how-air-evac-is-helping-crews-prepare-for-a-pilot-incapacitation-event/#:~:text=Air Evac developed a risk control in,in the simulator around once a month.

(BTW, a google search found this within seconds)

See your own words below. While I condensed your statement to a single word, anyone with a modest comprehension of English will agree that both statements are similar in action.
But feel free to educate us in how your statement is so vastly different than the way I condensed it.

"Push Down" and "drop" have two entirely different meanings when discussing the maneuver at hand. I get it, you know zero about helicopters and helicopter flight so you keep making assumptions with no evidence to back it up. You don't even know which control I'm speaking about nor the amount of push down required, nor the relation to the other controls or airspeed.

From the article above:

One important lesson the OCC specialists learned from their simulator runs was to build safety buffers into their guidance. For example, the HeliSAS autopilot in Air Evac’s helicopters will disengage below a forward airspeed of 45 knots. Initially, the OCC specialists coached “crewmembers” to slow the aircraft to around 50 knots before touching down in a run-on landing. “We were finding that things could change so rapidly that all of a sudden the aircraft would get too slow,” Allison recalled. “[The autopilot] would kick off and it would have happened so fast that we couldn’t react to it, because we just weren’t in the cockpit.” The result was usually an uncontrolled descent short of the runway, with catastrophic results.

Rather than persist with that strategy, Allison said, “we started doing landings at higher speeds and they turned out a lot better than we thought. So instead of trying to touch down at 50, 55 knots, we were touching down at 65, and that run-on worked just fine every time and we never got into any of these dangerous situations.”



Here's the pilot station of the B206L (EMS Configuration)

You really love throwing insults around, buddy. Does it make you feel better about yourself? Some people were nice enough to tug on your sleeve and remind you to behave, all you did was double down on your behavior. And not just in this thread.
Your behavior reminds me of Marvin Falitz, captain of Northwest Airlink Flight 5719.

 

[AV8R_87]

Meltdown? Seriously

Look at how you (over)reacted.

It was considered a partial incapacitation as the pilot did regain enough consciousness before touchdown on the runway to get the helicopter on the ground without damage.

The reg says nothing about the degree of incapacitation. It's something that never made it to the NTSB, despite being required.

"Push Down" and "drop" have two entirely different meanings when discussing the maneuver at hand.

Please enlighten the non-worthy, oh you mighty pilot...

You don't even know which control I'm speaking about nor the amount of push down required, nor the relation to the other controls or airspeed.

Oh, you really think you are God's gift to aviation, don't you?

 

[Doc Holliday]

The reg says nothing about the degree of incapacitation. It's something that never made it to the NTSB, despite being required.

You need to take this up with Air Evac. I had zero to do with that.

Please enlighten the non-worthy, oh you mighty pilot...

Oh, you really think you are God's gift to aviation, don't you?

I’ll just quote you.

“Look at how you (over)reacted.“

 

[AV8R_87]

I’ll just quote you.

“Look at how you (over)reacted.“

You reap what you sow.

 

[X3 Skier]

How did I get back in Middle School? Better move to a different lunch table

 

[Warlock]

Just as a late to the game observation cause I was on a boat…I would rather hit in a controlled crash at 50 knots moving forward than 30 and starting to rotate…for what it’s worth…

 

[MFE]

Girls, girls, girls! There's enough attention to go around.

 

[Velocity173]

Just to clarify. The touchdown speeds I gave and equivalent effect on yaw, are just a swag. Real world isn’t that simple. While I have no doubt that Air Evac had good results with alignment at 65 kts, what were the pedals set at? How much did the aircraft weigh?

Say the incapacitation happens during climb out or even high speed cruise, essentially you’re looking at a stuck left pedal (counter clockwise main rotor) scenario. Well depending on how much pedal was being applied, you could actually bring it in to a hover. If you try a high speed run on with that amount of left pedal with the corresponding low collective (torque), you’ll be touching down with nose pointed 30-45 degrees left. That’s not good.

If the incapacitation occurs during the descent, it’s essentially a stuck right pedal scenario. The worse of the two. For that one speed is your friend. If you slow anywhere near 30 kts ish, it’s gonna start to spin. Of course they could slowly roll the throttle off and bring the nose back leff but unless they’re a few feet up, I wouldn’t advise it. It’s really asking a lot from a non pilot to adjust throttle and possibly enter a low speed auto.

So there’s canned scenarios (neutral pedals) and there’s real world where you have several variables affecting yaw rate. I would imagine in a true incapacitation the pilots feet might not simply rest on the pedals either. One leg might immediately go fully extended. Game over in that case.

 

[Doc Holliday]

Just to clarify. The touchdown speeds I gave and equivalent effect on yaw, are just a swag. Real world isn’t that simple. While I have no doubt that Air Evac had good results with alignment at 65 kts, what were the pedals set at? How much did the aircraft weigh?

Say the incapacitation happens during climb out or even high speed cruise, essentially you’re looking at a stuck left pedal (counter clockwise main rotor) scenario. Well depending on how much pedal was being applied, you could actually bring it in to a hover. If you try a high speed run on with that amount of left pedal with the corresponding low collective (torque), you’ll be touching down with nose pointed 30-45 degrees left. That’s not good.

If the incapacitation occurs during the descent, it’s essentially a stuck right pedal scenario. The worse of the two. For that one speed is your friend. If you slow anywhere near 30 kts ish, it’s gonna start to spin. Of course they could slowly roll the throttle off and bring the nose back leff but unless they’re a few feet up, I wouldn’t advise it. It’s really asking a lot from a non pilot to adjust throttle and possibly enter a low speed auto.

So there’s canned scenarios (neutral pedals) and there’s real world where you have several variables affecting yaw rate. I would imagine in a true incapacitation the pilots feet might not simply rest on the pedals either. One leg might immediately go fully extended. Game over in that case.

All valid points. Like I mentioned above, this maneuver is not about trying to save the helicopter, it's about getting down to a survivable conclusion.

 

[hindsight2020]

caught a blurb on one of the the uboober channels about the prelim stating the second class wasn't "valid after expiration" could imply the medical for this pilot carried an SI with it. Is that an accurate inference? The prelim report does not speak to whether or not the pilot had an SI, doesn't give the age either which I thought was standard, but maybe I'm thinking of final reports. At any rate, seems relevant given survivor witness statements, chiefly from the BAMF who single handedly trivialized away the need for an ATP-rotor (/s i'm just playing), make it clear this was an incapacitation event.