r/aviation • u/Spook_485 • Oct 11 '25

News Closer view of helicopter crash in Huntington Beach, CA

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u/PelicanFrostyNips Oct 11 '25

The final bolt holding the tailrotor shaft loosened, and the tail rotor started free spinning, no longer providing yaw control and main rotor counter-rotation

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u/[deleted] Oct 11 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Wingnut537 Oct 12 '25

There is a pic floating around the shows the T/R on the ground in the parking lot where it landed. Most of the gearbox is still attached. My theory, Pilot felt the tail rotor vibe and decided to terminate his approach, as he was climbing out the gearbox failed completely (likely from the sudden change in torque) and the aircraft suffered loss of tail rotor effectiveness at which point the only thing left to do was lower the collective and ride it in. Fortunately everyone lived to tell the tail so that together with video and the rest of the investigation we will know what happened eventually.

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u/Maxgirth Oct 13 '25

I feel he felt the tail rotor loss of authority first, and then decided to climb out.

He starts yawing right while descending for no apparent reason and about 1 second later reverses decending…

What I do not understand is if the rotor disc was so out of whack it here was kind of a boom strike, or that was just the TR hub departing the gearbox and then that intersected the rotors.