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| Date: | Wednesday 2 January 2013 |
| Time: | 12:45 LT |
| Type: |  Eurocopter EC 130B4 |
| Owner/operator: | Air Methods Corp (AMC) |
| Registration: | N334AM |
| MSN: | 4694 |
| Year of manufacture: | 2010 |
| Total airframe hrs: | 1121 hours |
| Engine model: | Turbomeca ARRIEL 2B1 |
| Fatalities: | Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 4 |
| Other fatalities: | 0 |
| Aircraft damage: | Destroyed |
| Location: | NE of Seminole (KSRE), OK -
 United States of America
|
| Phase: | Initial climb |
| Nature: | Ferry/positioning |
| Departure airport: | Seminole, OK (KSRE) |
| Okemah, OK | |
| Investigating agency: | NTSB |
| Confidence Rating: |  Accident investigation report completed and information captured |
The pilot reported hearing a sound like something had struck the helicopter shortly after departure while about 1,600 to 1,700 feet mean sea level. The engine lost power, and the pilot performed an autorotation to a field. While maneuvering to land, he saw a barbed wire fence obstructing the intended landing area, so he maneuvered the helicopter to clear the fence. The helicopter subsequently cleared the fence and landed hard in a field.
Engine examination revealed that the four axial compressor blades exhibited significant deformation on the outboard tips of their leading edges in the direction opposite of normal rotation consistent with the ingestion of soft body foreign object debris, such as ice. A subsequent engine run did not detect any preimpact anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. For 3 days before the accident flight, the helicopter was parked outside without its engine cover installed and was exposed to light drizzle, rain, mist, and fog. The engine inlet cover was installed the day before the accident at an unknown time. The helicopter remained outside and exposed to freezing temperatures throughout the night until 2 hours before the flight. Although the helicopter was maintained in a ready status on the helipad and maintenance personnel performed daily preflight/airworthiness checks, the inlet to the first-stage of the axial compressor was not inspected to ensure that it was free of ice in accordance with the Aircraft Maintenance Manual. Based on the weather conditions that the helicopter was exposed to during the 3 days before the accident, it is likely that ice formed in the engine air inlet before the flight and that, when the pilot increased the engine power during takeoff, the accumulated ice separated from the inlet and was ingested by the engine and damaged the compressor blades.
Probable Cause: The loss of engine power due to ice ingestion. Contributing to the accident was maintenance personnel’s delayed decision to install the helicopter's engine inlet cover until after the engine had been exposed to moisture and freezing temperatures and their inadequate daily preflight/airworthiness checks, which did not detect the ice formation.
Accident investigation:
 |
|
Sources:
https://app.ntsb.gov/pdfgenerator/ReportGeneratorFile.ashx?EventID=20130102X73050&AKey=1&RType=HTML&IType=FA
http://aerossurance.com/helicopters/amc-hems-ec130b4-ice-ingestion/
Location
Media:
#OTD2013: Air Methods #EC130 Seminole, OK, Ice Ingestion Upon Take Off: late fitment of engine covers and failure to detect subsequent icehttps://t.co/QAKFmyIONS#flightsafety pic.twitter.com/h41ZgiBH8d
— Aerossurance (@Aerossurance) January 2, 2019
OTD in 2013: Within a year a US #HEMS operator repeats a Canadian police air accident. A reminder to protect and check engine intakes.https://t.co/xniNBfAkwg #helicopter #flightsafety #humanfactors pic.twitter.com/K4FzHVQoVc
— Aerossurance (@Aerossurance) January 2, 2020
Revision history:
| Date/time | Contributor | Updates |
|---|---|---|
| 03-Jan-2013 02:53 | gerard57 | Added |
| 03-Jan-2013 02:54 | harro | Updated [Aircraft type, Cn, Operator, ] |
| 03-Jan-2013 17:05 | Geno | Updated [Time, Operator, Location, Phase, Departure airport, Destination airport, Source, Narrative, ] |
| 09-Jan-2013 22:32 | Geno | Updated [Time, Source, Narrative, ] |
| 06-Mar-2013 14:07 | TB | Updated [Time, Aircraft type, Operator, Location, Departure airport, Source, Damage, Narrative, ] |
| 04-Aug-2014 06:20 | Aerossurance | Updated [Narrative, ] |
| 30-Oct-2014 17:28 | TB | Updated [Aircraft type, ] |
| 29-Mar-2015 12:57 | Aerossurance | Updated [Source, ] |
| 21-Dec-2016 19:28 | ASN Update Bot | Updated [Time, Damage, Category, Investigating agency, ] |
| 28-Nov-2017 14:05 | ASN Update Bot | Updated [Operator, Other fatalities, Nature, Departure airport, Destination airport, Source, Narrative, ] |
| 02-Jan-2019 19:50 | Aerossurance | Updated [Time, Other fatalities, Source, Embed code, ] |
| 02-Jan-2020 17:35 | Aerossurance | Updated [Operator, Source, Embed code, Damage, ] |
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