I heard there was a AEL aircraft that went down last night. Did everyone make it out safe?

AEL posted on their FB page "all three crew members perished in the crash". Prayers for AEL, the community and all those affected. 

RIP folks, im sorry.

all perished. 206 on way back to base after dropping patient at hospital in OKC.

https://kfor.com/news/three-killed-in-weatherford-air-evac-helicopter-crash/amp/ 

probably didn't have anything to do with the aircraft 

N295AE

Sad. RIP...

200' AGL at 120 knots at night doesn't sound like the HAA flight profiles I would expect at AEL

Last reported ADS-B Point from FlightAware:

Heliport where is took off, OL16, is 1150' MSL KOJA is 1600' MSL. Near the accident site, 2O8, MSL is 1600. The ground elevation rose as the flight continued

Aircraft flew at 1500MSL for probably 6-7 minutes then climbed to 1700MSL for the rest of the flight.

If this is correct, it never flew more than 350' AGL and steadily lost altitude above AGL. Got low enough to hit wires or anything else.

And where is the rotor head from the main wreckage? I can't tell.

is two seperate pictures

VH

The altimeter setting from OKC at the 2252 METAR was 30.44, which means the aircraft MSL altitude was actually about 520 feet higher than the ADS-B altitude.

Looks like that bird was not equipped with rad alt.  Had it been, May have prevented this mishap.

Rising terrain, night time.  seems like pilot was skimming the ground??

Could be wrong.  High pressure makes it hard to calc.  If it was a 29.92 day this flight aware data would be much easier to interpret.

If one were to compare a similar flight....

https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/N295AE/history/20240115/0144Z/OL16/4OK1

One would see the prefered Alt at all phases of flight over the same terrain. .... Proper clearances long the way, and good ground separation.

Something was very wrong with the final flight and failure to increase alt for rising terrain.

Moon phase and rise on 20th showed there should have been plenty of good vis on a night flight even with overcast skies.

Lack of awareness of rising terrain?  Was the pilot familiar with this route?  Or was it his first run from that Heliport?

RIP to the lost.

the baro set for 14 jan was much the same value as 20 jan

https://www.timeanddate.com/weather/usa/oklahoma-city/historic

 

Don't think there were any towers near the crash site.   

That tower was unlit according to NOTAM. 
I was thinking they possibly hit the tower. 

Can that whole trip be completed with a full bag in a 206L3? Was there fuel at any of the hospitals?

They had done the trip 3 times in the last month, about 1.5 hours total.  I doubt running out of fuel because the ADSB coverage over there is great and will pick them up all the way to the ground based on previous ADSB data.  This aircraft literally vanished off the ADSB map while still at cruise altitude/speed and the wreckage is only 600' away from that point.  Even the worst possible auto the aircraft would at least transmit data on the way down.  Aircraft landed inverted with a main rotor separated from the aircraft and on said main rotor one of the blades is broken at the root or completely missing, picture quality hard to see.  Even a flock of geese I wouldnt expect a blade broken off at the attachment point.  Once better pictures show up that show where the other parts of the main rotor blades are it will become much clearer.

Mast bumping, wouldn't the ADSB data show that? Just asking for a friend. 

Depends on where their transponder antenna is, sometime during an inflight breakup the transponder, GPS and antenna stay connected and give out another 2-3 seconds of data on the way down but sometimes a tail chop will take out one of the antennas and you lose that chance of another 1 or 2 pings.  I can still go with hitting a goose / geese causing what we see so far its just that one main rotor blade that appears missing all the way to the attachment point that feels odd.  Even during mast bumps/ tail chops that blades stay attached to the roots and break off where they hit the tail and unfortunely the cabin structure.  

From what I have seen posted on here they were flying at around 200 ft agl.  No matter the cause what the hell were they doing flying at 200 ft.  At night.  Why do people keep doing this.
please stop. Think.  

They absolutely were not flying around 200 ft agl. Every person commenting on here that thinks so needs to turn in their certificate (if they have one). For the last ime, ADS-B reported altutude that we observe on Flight Aware IS NOT CORRECTED TO MSL!! It simply transmits the pressure altitude. Based on the altimeter setting at the time the reported altitude will be 520' lower than the MSL altitude they were flyig at. I have no idea what AEL's GOM says about minimum enroute altitudes, but they were not flying at 1700 MSL! Somewhere around 2200'MSL!

>>>>>>>>  Mast bumping, wouldn't the ADSB data show that? Just asking for a friend.

ADSB transmits location data.  If there were a catastrphic event and the transmitter was destroyed, or electrical power interrupted, the ADSB would not show it at all.

I would deduce if it were a bird strike capable of bringing down that aircraft, wouldn't there be some residual blood, guts, feathers, etc which could easily be identified?

Just a thought...

v/r

It seems obviously catastrophic, due to the fact that the ADSB end abruptly.  It looks like he was flying along and turned off the power.  No change in speed or altitude and the data suddenly stops. 

The NTSB will probably figure this one out quickly.  (And if he DID collide with that tower, as suggested, they probably have already found evidence of that.)

Yanked back on the cyclic, then forward, low G, mast bumping. Game over. 

R.I.P. 

Crash was 1.6nm prior to towers. Geese into the cabin with rapid aft then forward cyclic for mast bump I can see. No fire on impact so will be easy for them to find any bird remains to rule it in or out. There is now aerial footage showing larger scene and the other rotor blade is only 100 feet away from the rotor head so that rules out throwing a blade. Rotor and main cabin were not zoomed out enough to see both but they look far apart which continues support for mast bump. 

I can speak for everyone at PHI and say.....

Condolences to all invloved. To all the family, friends, and AE employees this touched, you are in our thoughts and prayers. Please rest in peace to those that passed.  

That seems way off.

If you google earth that crash area and see eye view the elevation shows 1,565ft.

https://earth.google.com/web/@35.55070981,-98.54566407,476.37454527a,6178.26056539d,35y,359.60221527h,0t,0r/data=OgMKATA

Now we all know the flightaware mode c data is shown at 29.92.  So if it fell off of the map at 1700ft reported alt on a 30.44 baro set day, the best he could have been was actual MSL alt of +476.2ft or 2176 ft (msl)

MSL from elevation equals AGL.  2176-1565ft= 611ft. AGL.

U can check the math here.

https://www.weather.gov/epz/wxcalc_pressurealtitude

There was a lowering of pressure going on also to consider.  High to low look out below.

The baro was steadily falling that day and into the next day.

I think rising terrain coupled with a falling baro and a failure to increase alt and hold a cruise alt of only hundreds of feet above ground level may have caused this accident.

 

hum

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TTZ5_wR8mk

of the severed tail at the gearbox/fin near the main wreckage seems to me that the main rotor was still swinging pretty good when it chopped the boom....probably fairly near the ground. 

Seems heavy pitch inputs could have done this one in.

Seems like the main rotor head is not too far from the main debris field but hard to say as the video does not connect the two very well.

A pan out is what was needed on this footage.

25 minutes flying...  close to the ground...  ADSB data shows cruise flight with autopilot on ... only 100 feet AGL  in last seconds... passing over a tree line.

 I really question the pilot on this one. 

GMR requires 1000' AGL in cruise...   clearly not complied with here... 

on any debris on the ground....No fire at all.....did this aircraft have crash resistent tanks? was this a Low Fuel situation or did they get fuel heading back to base....just kinda curious seems unusual for the damage..

Composit blade failure?

Each company OWNED by GMR has their own GOM and rules....don't throw the rest of us in the mix of this...

GMR does not require 1000 AGL in cruise flight, but rather recommends it.

Of coarse now it may be mandated.

Every is suddenly an NTSB expert 

If no evidence of birds look for swash plate bearing failure.

that show it sitting about 30 yards from the head and other blade.

the blade part you mention is the remaining blade attached to the hub. Still missing one blade.

And looking at the compact debris field and distances my guess is they lost the missing blade in flight.

The detached blade was found about 100' from the main wreckage. 

It's called "Blue Blades" which normally happens after a severe cyclic imput when you're unfortunatly plowing thru a flock of geese. RIP!! 

Bell over the years has had a few failures of rotor hub TT strap. That's my guess of the catastrophe.

the hub and grip are still together.  Blade is broken.

https://www.vanhornaviation.com/vha-responds-to-tsb-report-a19p0142

the response from Survival Flight CEO after the NTSB report came out.  🤣🤣🤣🤦‍♂️

https://irp.cdn-website.com/e3690e0e/files/uploaded/Van%20Horn%20Aviation%20Response%20to%20Air%20Transportation%20Safety%20Investigation%20Report%20A19P0142%20-%20technical.pdf

The larger techincal response from Van Horne about the blades in the previous referenced accident.

Very sad day for HEMS crews all around and our thoughts and prayers are with the friends and families of the crew that was lost.

FlightAware FAQ regarding altitudes:

https://www.flightaware.com/about/faq/#AGLorMSL

These accidents are voluntary. These HAA problems have already been solved in the 121 world, years if not decades ago and the only reason that the same solutions aren't used in HAA is because they cost too much so we continue to trade profits for lives. HAA needs two pilots, IFR, NVG, HTAWS with mandated escape maneuver, cat A operations, an aircraft that can carry it all, and an OCC that does flight planning and has joint authroity. And by the way, med crew won't be real flight crew until it requires an FAA certificate and training. Yep, it would take a AW139 sized aircraft to do it and would require a bunch of OCC personnel but it would also save almost all of these lives that continue to be lost for the same reasons, year after year. Until then, thoughts and prayers is about all that can be offered.

helicopter operations, by their very nature, are much more dangerous than 121 ops. the big helicopters with 2 pilots and nvgs crash a lot, too. you can't compare the two in any meaningful way bro

No mention of higher quality, better paid maintenance positions? Just checked yesterday and that program had job posting for mechanic? How long have they been without a mechanic? How many preflights were done by Pilot before a mechanic put eyes on? To many operators going without mechanics for weeks at a time... Time to pay these guys and have enough around to operate safely... God bless the crews and families!!!

since when does a job posting mean nobody is there. since never

yeah, a whole bunch of OCC personnel and a big helicopter that can carry "it all" with 2 pilots and NVGs! equal no more accidents ohand med crews something something

do all haa flights in 737s and it would cut way down on accidents. prove me wrong

Every scene flight landing would result in a crash.

does it biff