NTSB CAROL · Event
Event WPR23LA068
Registry · N255SD
FAA Aircraft Registry record.
Make / Model
EUROCOPTER EC120B
Year of manufacture
2000 · 22 years old at event
TCDS
R0001RD · AIRBUS HELICOPTERS
Engine
TURBOMECA ARRIUS 2F (432 hp)
Seats / Engines
5 seats · 1 engine
Last airworthiness date
20000714
ADS-B equipped
Yes — Mode-S A26BA5
Registrant of record
SACRAMENTO COUNTY SHERIFFS OFFICE
Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).
Aircraft involved
Probable cause & findings
The pilot receiving instruction’s loss of helicopter control during landing with a crosswind, and the flight instructor’s delayed remedial action.
Factual narrative
The flight instructor reported that the pilot receiving instruction was practicing an offsite landing in an open area. While descending on approach to the site, the airspeed decayed to 35 kts. The flight instructor prompted for an increase in airspeed, the pilot flying acknowledged, applied forward cyclic, right pedal, and continued turning left into the wind. They encountered an uncommanded left yaw and the pilot receiving instruction added right pedal until he reached full deflection. The flight instructor then assumed control of the helicopter and pushed forward on the cyclic as he lowered the collective. The instructor attempted to recover from the uncommanded left yaw; however, but the helicopter spun several times. Unable to gain forward airspeed, the flight instructor began a descent. The helicopter subsequently landed hard substantially damaging the underside of the fuselage. The flight instructor reported that there were no preaccident mechanical malfunctions or failures with the helicopter that would have precluded normal operation. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database Retrieved: 2026-02-12
NTSB Findings
Hierarchical cause / factor breakdown from the FAA bulk avdata database. Each finding tagged C (Cause) or F (Factor).
- — Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Wind-Crosswind-Effect on operation
- — Personnel issues-Task performance-Use of equip/info-Aircraft control-Student/instructed pilot
- — Personnel issues-Action/decision-Action-Delayed action-Instructor/check pilot
- — Personnel issues-Psychological-Attention/monitoring-Monitoring other person-Instructor/check pilot
Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file
NTSB_2022_WPR23LA068.txt.
Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb.
Full investigation docket on
data.ntsb.gov ↗.
Beyond the agency record
Search this event elsewhere.
Pre-filled searches into the sources where news + community discussion of aviation events lives. External sources are reported, not agency. Treat them as signal that something happened, not as fact about what happened.
Entity-clustered aviation events in the press — last 24 hr + 30-day archive.
Official agency record + docket.
Investigative docket: factual reports, photos, transcripts.
Long-running aviation incident database (Flight Safety Foundation).
Community NTSB synthesis blog — often has photos and witness reports.
Gold-standard aviation incident blog.
Aviation industry news search.
GA pilot forum — informed but rumor-prone.
GA pilot subreddit search.
Tail-number page — flight history (free tier limited).
AOPA Air Safety Institute search.
Mainstream press coverage. Recent events only.
Privacy-preserving news search.
External links open in a new tab. We don't ingest their content; we deep-link search queries.
Related research
What the literature says.
Academic papers and agency reports matching this event's aircraft type or causal vocabulary (icing). Sourced from NASA NTRS, NTSB Safety Studies, FAA CAMI, AOPA Air Safety Institute, Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons, arXiv, and the Semantic Scholar academic graph.
- NASA NTRS 2026 · Contractor Report (CR)
Icing Physics Studies Using the 3D SIDRM Test Article: 2023 Icing Tests Analysis
In-flight icing is an important safety issue and is a factor that affects aircraft design and performance. Newer regulations are driving a need for improvements in airframe and engine icing simulation…
- arXiv 2025 · arXiv preprint
Multi-Agent Deep Reinforcement Learning for UAV-Assisted 5G Network Slicing: A Comparative Study of MAPPO, MADDPG, and MADQN
The growing demand for robust, scalable wireless networks in the 5G-and-beyond era has led to the deployment of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) as mobile base stations to enhance coverage in dense urb…
- Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons 2025 · Journal article (JAAER)
A Mathematical Model on the Temporal Dynamics of Aviation Competitive Pricing
This study investigates the competitive dynamics of airport pricing using U.S. airport data to validate the findings. It employs linear and nonlinear ordinary differential equation models to analyze t…
- NASA NTRS 2025 · Presentation
NASA Icing Update – March 2025
This NASA Icing Update was prepared for presentation to the SAE International AC-9C Inflight Icing Technology Committee. This update includes the following topics: planned Rotational Icing Scaling tes…
- arXiv 2024 · arXiv preprint
An energy-stable phase-field model for droplet icing simulations
A phase-field model for three-phase flows is established by combining the Navier-Stokes (NS) and the energy equations, with the Allen-Cahn (AC) and Cahn-Hilliard (CH) equations and is demonstrated ana…
- NASA NTRS 2024 · Presentation
NASA Icing Update – Oct 2024
This presentation provides a status update on select NASA icing research activities for the SAE AC-9C Icing Technical Committee Meeting on Oct 21, 2024.
Browse the full corpus — academia portal ↗