NTSB releases preliminary report on air ambulance crash

A preliminary report by the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has described the crash of an Air Methods medical helicopter in Philadelphia on 11 January 2022.

The four-page report says that the EC-135 P2+ was caught on video by a doorbell camera about one mile from the crash site, entering what the four-page report describes as a ‘near vertical, nose-down descent’.

The medic on board the flight was also quoted as part of the report, describing that the helicopter ‘rolled inverted, perhaps multiple times’ during its descent and that he and the nurse were ‘pinned to the ceiling’ briefly.

This aligns with a statement by an eyewitness, who said that they had seen the helicopter falling ‘in a nose-down attitude’ and ‘rotating around its longitudinal axis’ before the crash.

The report says that the helicopter’s angle of descent apparently ‘shallowed’ before disappearing from the video behind a tree line.

The aircraft came to a halt outside a church, avoiding all buildings

The flight medic also reported that the flight had been routine for most of the time, and that the helicopter was about 10 minutes from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) before problems were experienced. Then, they reported hearing a bang directly before the helicopter ‘banked sharply right and continued into a barrel roll’.

Also noted in the report was that another home doorbell camera captured the last second of the flight, in which the ‘helicopter appeared level in the frame, in a slight nose-up attitude as it impacted the ground, separating the tailboom, then disappeared from view’.

On the way down, the pilot, Danial Moore, 52, was able to avoid the surrounding homes and buildings, telephone poles, and wires, but eventually made impact with a 40-foot tall tree.

Eventually the helicopter, owned by HEMS provider Air Methods, crash-landed on the corner of Bloomfield Avenue and Burmont Road, skidding to a stop on the lawn of Drexel Hill United Methodist Church.

All four people onboard survived the crash

Rescue crews were able to successfully extract all four individuals onboard from the wreckage without life-threatening injuries – the pilot, two medical staff and an infant patient. Both patient and crew are reportedly receiving medical evaluation.

The aircraft had been transporting a two-month-old baby girl from WellSpan Chambersburg Hospital southwest of Harrisburg, to CHOP.

The remains of the aircraft have been taken to an aircraft recovery facility in Clayton, Delaware, as part of the still ongoing NTSB investigation.