- Date
- January 2, 1982, 14:15 local (21:15 UTC)
- Place
- Midway, UT
- Injuries
- 1 uninjured
- Damage
- Destroyed
- Phase of flight
- Taxi
- Aircraft
- N51735Enstrom 280C
- Weather
- Instrument (IMC) · Day
- Status
- Completed · report January 2, 1983
- Report
- Approved by Office Director
- FAA report
- 19820102000139A
- Case key
- 71702
From the NTSB’s public API. By law, NTSB reports can’t be used as evidence in lawsuits over the accident.
On this page
Sequence of events
NTSB’s coding before 2008: each occurrence and phase of flight, and the causes and factors under it. The codes are defined in NTSB’s coding manual.
Analysis
The aircraft crashed while being moved about 150 ft from the parking area to a storage building. There was about 2 1/2 ft of fresh snow on the ground. The snow had been cleared from the parking area in front of the storage building. However, a snow cat had moved into the parking area and had stopped as the pilot was approaching to land. The pilot reported this made the parking area unusable. Before touchdown, the pilot experienced a white-out condition due to the heavy circulation of snow and became disoriented. The aircraft landed hard in a nose down attitude.
Aircraft
- Registration
- N51735
- Reported as
- Enstrom 280C
- Category
- Helicopter
- Serial number
- 1139
- Airframe hours
- 287
- Engine
- Lycoming HIO-360-E1BD, 205 horsepower, reciprocating
- Damage
- Destroyed
- Flight
- Personal · Part 91
- Operator
- Cass R. Ward
- Registered owner
- Mt. States Hot Oil, Inc.
- Departed
- Field Ranch
- Destination
- Field Ranch
- Airport
- Field Ranch
Matched to the registry by N-number and the event date; the registry’s history has gaps, so older matches can be wrong. Compare the reported make and model.
Flight crew
As NTSB recorded them. NTSB leaves out names.
- Role
- Pilot
- Age
- 34
- Certificate
- Private
- Airplane ratings
- Single-engine land
- Medical
- Unknown, Unknown
- Flight hours
- 109 total · 109 in this make and model · 7 in the last 90 days · 1 in the last 24 hours
Weather
- Conditions
- Instrument (IMC) · Day
- Wind
- Calm
- Lowest ceiling
- 300 ft overcast
- Temperature
- 68 °F
FAA reports on this event · 1
The FAA’s own accident and incident reports, matched to the aircraft by N-number and date.