Posted on 04/10/2025 2:42:51 PM PDT by lowbridge
A helicopter broke apart in midair and crashed upside-down into the Hudson River between Manhattan and the New Jersey waterfront Thursday, killing six people in the latest high-profile aviation disaster in the U.S., according to witnesses and a law enforcement official.
The New York Fire Department said it received a report of the crash at 3:17 p.m. All six people aboard were killed, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press. The official was not authorized to speak publicly and did so on condition of anonymity.
Witness Bruce Wall said he saw the helicopter “falling apart” in midair, with the tail and propeller coming off. The propeller was still spinning without the aircraft as it fell, he said.
Lesly Camacho, a hostess at a restaurant along the river in Hoboken, New Jersey, said she saw the helicopter spinning uncontrollably before it slammed into the water.
“There was a bunch of smoke coming out. It was spinning pretty fast, and it landed in the water really hard,” she said in a phone interview.
Video posted to social media showed parts of the chopper splashing into the water, and the overturned aircraft was submerged, with rescue boats circling it.
The skies were overcast at the time, but visibility over the river was not substantially impaired. Rescue crews had to deal with 45-degree water temperatures.
The Federal Aviation Administration identified the helicopter as a Bell 206, a model widely used in commercial and government aviation, including by sightseeing companies, TV news stations and police departments. It was initially developed for the U.S. Army before being adapted for other uses. Thousands have been manufactured over the years.
The National Transportation Safety Board said it would investigate.
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
Damn. Sounds like a broken rod or loose bolt to cause the propeller to separate, but someone with helicopter maintenance experience can chime in with more accurate descriptors.
The pilot...or another passenger was engaging in some reckless showboating a few minutes before the rotors either distintigrated or hit something else and came off
Looks like parts were falling off
Video of crash
All 6 people onboard the helicopter that crashed in the Hudson river are dead
https://rumble.com/v6rxfyj-helicopter-crashes-into-hudson-river.html
Horrifying! Loads of aircraft issues lately!
Well for starters, they are not called propellers. Main rotor, tail rotor. Just sayin’.
Maybe more video, earlier in the sequence will be found
How do you know that? (Not doubting it, just didn’t pick that up.)
There are videos on Twitter that show the rotor was the first thing to hit the water.
I don’t know if that means anything.
“The tragedy marks the latest in a series of aircraft disasters in the area in recent years, including a 2018 crash of a charter helicopter offering ‘open door’ flights that went down into the East River between Manhattan and Brooklyn, killing five people.
In 2009, another tourist helicopter also collided with a plane over the Hudson River, killing nine people.”
Far too many. It’s time for DEI to D-I-E once and for all.
♫ Look for the DEI Symbol... ♫
Check X. Someone followed the craft with their phone for several minutes, as it made a couple of very steep dives and then flew normally after each one. About a minute later, in other videos, something catastrophic occured.
Posts I’ve read on other boards also suggest that the pilot may have been “hot-dogging”.
There are videos showing erratic flying prior to failure.
Perhaps trying to “thrill” the passengers on board?
Perhaps totally unrelated and indicative of some mechanical problem leading to control failure.
Eventually we’ll find out.
Thanks.
Supposedly 3 of the 6 dead are children.
Check X. Someone followed the craft with their phone for several minutes, as it made a couple of very steep dives and then flew normally after each one.
The video I saw was a claiming to be the mishap helo from today was also posted back in 2019. More news to follow, I'm sure.
Could aviation be paying the price for being DEI? Maintenance personnel and pilots must be well trained and experienced to keep the aircraft safe for flight. DEI is just another tool of the progressives in their pursuit of mediocrity.
Lot of strange maneuvering just before the crash. I’m guessing some mechanical failure leading to a loss of control. OR medical issue with a pilot and a passenger trying to fly.
Either way, it eventually exceeded design limits and had a structural failure.
Anyone know if a commercially operated helo of that type will have any kind of data recorder? And also, it remains to be seen if he said called out with any emergency or difficulty.
“Someone followed the craft with their phone for several minutes, as it made a couple of very steep dives and then flew normally after each one.”
It would be kinda weird for the pilot to do that on purpose. Maybe a control issue, or a medical issue and a non-pilot in the other seat tried to fly it and just couldn’t accomplish it.
I think we will get some answers eventually...
I slowed the video down. Apparently all the rotor blades came off the hub and it wasn’t spinning any more. It’s like the motor rotator locked up causing the blades to shear off.
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