Bald Mountain Helitack Helicopter Crash Fatality 1991

A Bell 206L1 helicopter was dispatched to a lightning fire on the Stanislaus National Forest, California, at around 1500 hrs, July 26, 1991. The pilot first transported helitack crewmembers to the fire, then transitioned to conducting bucket drops. After 12 drops, the pilot reconfigured for a cargo mission. He was to deliver two pillow water tanks to a location where they could gravity-feed a hoselay. While approaching the desired delivery location at around 1700 hrs, the helicopter appeared slow and his descent was rapid. He told crewmembers on the ground that the conditions were "squirrelly" and the advised that nobody should be near the load about to be delivered. The load hit the ground with force, and the pilot electronically jettisoned the load. The helicopter struggled to hover, then began to descend vertically. The pilot radioed to "get out of the way" and the helicopter descended until the main rotor struck a pine snag. The descent continued as the rotor system was destroyed and the tail boom was cut off. The helicopter pitched nose down and fell approximately 40 feet onto the pillow tank. The pilot, Gifford Keeth, was fatally injured. Investigators believed the helicopter entered a vortex ring state (also known as "settling with power") that the pilot was unable to counteract in the tight space he had.