Helicopter crash Logan County Wva

Velocity173 said:
Yep, N98F. Always hate to hear of any crash but like the B-17 a few years back, it’s really sad when the public is involved on a tourism flight
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Don't mean to be picky, but when is the public not involved in a tourism flight? RIP to the victims, condolences to their loved ones. A real tragedy to be certain.
 
steingar said:
Don't mean to be picky, but when is the public not involved in a tourism flight? RIP to the victims, condolences to their loved ones. A real tragedy to be certain.
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I’m talking about an accident with just crew on board vs one with the paying public. They were hoping to enjoy a ride on a historic aircraft but ended in tragedy. These accidents also cause negative publicity for future aircraft tourism. Just a sad deal all around.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
I wonder what the points of interest are in strip mining country?
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I think the article uses the word “tourism” as in the public getting a tour of the aircraft and its history vs a tour of the local surroundings. Orientation flight would probably be better wording.
 
One of our local pilots was killed in this crash. It sounds like he might have been the pilot. I knew he was a gyro pilot and he had a Cherokee 140. I spoke to him last week when he was getting the 140 annualed.

"My brother and best friend John Nagle earned his forever wings yesterday. He loved aviation and lost his life doing what he loved. He loved helicopters more than anything and was participating in an event in West Virginia piloting a UH-1 Huey. I have no details about the incident."
 
Lowflynjack said:
One of our local pilots was killed in this crash. It sounds like he might have been the pilot. I knew he was a gyro pilot and he had a Cherokee 140. I spoke to him last week when he was getting the 140 annualed.

"My brother and best friend John Nagle earned his forever wings yesterday. He loved aviation and lost his life doing what he loved. He loved helicopters more than anything and was participating in an event in West Virginia piloting a UH-1 Huey. I have no details about the incident."
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Oh that’s really sad. Sorry to hear.
 
Expect some more regulation of experimentals being used for common carriage.
 
Damn sad. The B model is the smoothest flying of all the Hueys, but it’s a very old helicopter.
 
I heard they hit powerlines. For $250 you could fly right-seat and fly, while they were giving others rides for donations. We'll see what the NTSB says.
 
Piperonca said:
Damn sad. The B model is the smoothest flying of all the Hueys, but it’s a very old helicopter.
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I like the early Bs as well. Good looking Huey. Only one I’ve been on was a D model MEDEVAC though so I’ve got nothing to compare the ride to.
 
Looks as if they were charging $250 to take the controls during a 30 min flight - even for non-pilots, and this with passengers!

Event web page:
https://marpataviation.com/huey-reunion

Take the right seat and YOU can fly N98F!
  • You DO NOT need to be a pilot to make a reservation to fly!
  • Reservations will be for a 30-minute flight.
  • Each right seat flight requires a $250/30-minute donation to pay for fuel.
 
Himayeti said:
Looks as if they were charging $250 to take the controls during a 30 min flight - even for non-pilots, and this with passengers!

Event web page:
https://marpataviation.com/huey-reunion

Take the right seat and YOU can fly N98F!
  • You DO NOT need to be a pilot to make a reservation to fly!
  • Reservations will be for a 30-minute flight.
  • Each right seat flight requires a $250/30-minute donation to pay for fuel.
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I wondered about that too. Some big-muscled rando can get a deathgrip on the cyclic and be a problem. And with the Huey it's a little bit too far to reach over and smack him without losing control yourself.
 
Velocity173 said:
I like the early Bs as well. Good looking Huey. Only one I’ve been on was a D model MEDEVAC though so I’ve got nothing to compare the ride to.
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They had extra balance weights on both sides of the rotor hub. Probably helped with blade tracking.
 
Piperonca said:
The B model is the smoothest flying of all the Hueys,
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If I recall the original B models still had the narrow chord MR blades and narrow tail which made for a clean ride. Once the wide-chord blades came out with the thicker tails and asymmetrical elevators the ride suffered.
 
Himayeti said:
Looks as if they were charging $250 to take the controls during a 30 min flight - even for non-pilots, and this with passengers!

Event web page:
https://marpataviation.com/huey-reunion

Take the right seat and YOU can fly N98F!
  • You DO NOT need to be a pilot to make a reservation to fly!
  • Reservations will be for a 30-minute flight.
  • Each right seat flight requires a $250/30-minute donation to pay for fuel.
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Yeah, that "donation" thing. Gonna bite someone.
 
From the sounds of things, this aircraft and its operation were not operating under a Living History Flight Experience exemption. I'm guessing the legality of offering rides in an Experimental Exhibition Category aircraft under the guise of "donations", even allowing non-pilots to touch the controls with other passengers on board, is going to be a focus.
 
Lowflynjack said:
One of our local pilots was killed in this crash. It sounds like he might have been the pilot. I knew he was a gyro pilot and he had a Cherokee 140. I spoke to him last week when he was getting the 140 annualed.

"My brother and best friend John Nagle earned his forever wings yesterday. He loved aviation and lost his life doing what he loved. He loved helicopters more than anything and was participating in an event in West Virginia piloting a UH-1 Huey. I have no details about the incident."
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Yeah, .... I saw the post on the FB group page this morning. Just wow! My condolences!
 
B to C got the 540 Rotor and if you had a C “Mike” model you got the higher HP engine, I have a small amount in a C and 600 Hrs in an H. Setup and blade tracking was a key to making them smooth…this is sad as most of the operations I have seen doing this type of flights have the best of intentions…then again we will see as things play out.
 
Giving "rides" in a Experimental Exhibition category helicopter....for "donations".

facepalm-really.gif
 
midwestpa24 said:
From the sounds of things, this aircraft and its operation were not operating under a Living History Flight Experience exemption.
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Correct, not an LHFE operation.
 
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Gryder has a video out on N98F. The main thing I got out of skipping through it is that MARPAT was giving Nap of the Earth (NOE) rides with pax. The accident was alleged to have happened because the company did not do a route hazard survey of the one that was flown, which had wires. I might have missed something because I was doing all that video skipping while holding my nose, but that's the gist of it. Unforgivable malpractice, if true. With paying pax on board.
 
Piperonca said:
Gryder has a video out on N98F. The main thing I got out of skipping through it is that MARPAT was giving Nap of the Earth (NOE) rides with pax. The accident was alleged to have happened because the company did not do a route hazard survey of the one that was flown, which had wires. I might have missed something because I was doing all that video skipping while holding my nose, but that's the gist of it. Unforgivable malpractice, if true. With paying pax on board.
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Can’t stand Gryder playing “Ticket to Ride” in an accident like this but he seems on point with his assessment. Also noticed in the Huey pics, the B model didn’t have wire cutters. Aircraft really should’ve been restricted from NOE based on that limitation alone.
 
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One of their past flights from last year.

 
@Piperonca I noticed on the airspeed indicator a hash mark for 80 kts. In another vid, I hear the quasi IP state 80 kts or lower for this aircraft. That wasn’t a B limit was it?
 
Velocity173 said:
@Piperonca I noticed on the airspeed indicator a hash mark for 80 kts. In another vid, I hear the quasi IP state 80 kts or lower for this aircraft. That wasn’t a B limit was it?
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Don’t recall any B model limit like that, but it’s been quite a while. Not even sure why there would be a hash mark at such an airspeed. Post a vid with whatever time stamp and I will see if I can find out.
 
Piperonca said:
Don’t recall any B model limit like that, but it’s been quite a while. Not even sure why there would be a hash mark at such an airspeed. Post a vid with whatever time stamp and I will see if I can find out.
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In the vid above you can see it if you zoom in.
 
Yeah, I’m scratching my head over that one. The best I can come up with for now is that like many rotorcraft, there are different transmission and engine combinations depending on lot number. Quite often there are different operating limits for the different combinations, and also gross weight can play a role. For example, 80 KIAS could be for a certain gross weight or above. I was at AVSCOM St. Louis until the move to Redstone in 1997. Vans full of historic documents were sent to storage somewhere. That included decades worth of manuals and specs. On top of that, many of the guys who would know things like this without hesitation have either retired, died, or both. I do know at least one live one, though. Will ping him this week to see if he remembers.
 
Piperonca said:
Yeah, I’m scratching my head over that one. The best I can come up with for now is that like many rotorcraft, there are different transmission and engine combinations depending on lot number. Quite often there are different operating limits for the different combinations, and also gross weight can play a role. For example, 80 KIAS could be for a certain gross weight or above. I was at AVSCOM St. Louis until the move to Redstone in 1997. Vans full of historic documents were sent to storage somewhere. That included decades worth of manuals and specs. On top of that, many of the guys who would know things like this without hesitation have either retired, died, or both. I do know at least one live one, though. Will ping him this week to see if he remembers.
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I was thinking possibly a gross weight limit. I remember some of the older CH-47Ds had an airspeed or trq limit at high gross weight.
 
Just found this from a TCDS on the web:
2022-07-04_19-42-08.jpg
 
Dan Gryder has gotten almost everything wrong in this video, to include but not limited to: They weren't flying NOE. He misidentified the wires they hit. He characterized it as a profit making endeavor, which it most certainly wasn't. (They almost certainly operated at a loss in order to host the event.)

What's true is that MARPAT didn't have an LHFE for the riders, nor a LODA for the instruction that was taking place.
 
OverTQ said:
Dan Gryder has gotten almost everything wrong in this video, to include but not limited to: They weren't flying NOE. He misidentified the wires they hit. He characterized it as a profit making endeavor, which it most certainly wasn't. (They almost certainly operated at a loss in order to host the event.)

What's true is that MARPAT didn't have an LHFE for the riders, nor a LODA for the instruction that was taking place.
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NOE or not, they shouldn’t have been flying the routes that I saw at those altitudes. Based on the vid, they were flying at mostly contour / low level with maybe an excursion to NOE.
 
Velocity173 said:
NOE or not, they shouldn’t have been flying the routes that I saw at those altitudes. Based on the vid, they were flying at mostly contour / low level with maybe an excursion to NOE.
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I’ll buy contour. Plus, we know Gryder alleges things he extracts from rectal defilade…all of that said it appears the aircraft hit wires. It went down where they lived. They didn’t magically rise up to grab it out of the air.

Edit: Or maybe Bubba in the right seat jammed the cyclic randomly at a critical time. We may never know. Or maybe even something else. There's no scarcity of potential cause factors.
 
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