3:18 p.m. MT Feb. 22, 2022
Blackhawks landing at an LZ near Snowbird Ski Area in Utah, seconds before encountering trouble. Image via KSLTV.Two UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters went down this morning near a ski resort in Utah. It occured during a training exercise in American Fork Canyon near Snowbird.
As explained by Jared Jones, the Aviation Public Affairs Officer for the Utah National Guard, two of their helicopters were on short final to land in fresh snow at a frequently used LZ on National Forest land just outside the Snowbird ski area. “As it landed the snow kicked up and probably lost sight of the ground,” Mr. Jones said.
One of the helicopters had difficulty and ended up on its side without any main rotor blades. Mr. Jones said a piece of a rotor blade struck the second helicopter which then landed and remained upright.
There were no serious injuries, and the crews rode down the mountain on the ski lift.
For a couple of seconds you can see in the video below the two helicopters on short final to land at the LZ near the end of a lift at Snowbird. Then fresh snow kicked up obscuring the image of the helicopters, possibly creating white out conditions. Unusual sounds can then be heard.
SOUND ON: 🔊 Skiers capture the moment two Black Hawk helicopters from the Utah National Guard crashed in Mineral Basin near Snowbird.
Crash details: https://t.co/rwJRFwhDuN pic.twitter.com/btn8fUrW7I
— KUTV2news (@KUTV2News) February 22, 2022
Blackhawks down. Image via KSLTV.In the video below Mr. Jones briefs reporters on the incident (at about 1:20) while video recorded from a news helicopter over the incident plays in the background.
Helicopter pilots working on wildland fires may sometimes find themselves in similar situations, landing at unimproved helispots and encountering brown out conditions as dust obscures their vision. Attempts at mitigation can include wetting the helispot down with water from portable tanks, from engines, or water drops from helicopters.
Update at 5:53 p.m. MT Feb. 22, 2022
After looking at still photos of the site and a video, it appears that the helicopter that remained upright lost its tail rotor and spun around before it settled on the ground.
Here is another video of the incident.
Here is a video of the Blackhawks crashing while we were riding down Mineral Basin around 9:30 am. Military buddy I was riding with recognized the Hawks coming in to land. So far sounds like everyone was ok from what we’ve heard. Thankfully! Video cred: Tom Carney #snowbird pic.twitter.com/JKTAqndqdE
— Cory Inman (@IM_Inman) February 22, 2022
Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Rick.
9 Comments
Bad call on the pilots
May have been a poor decision as well to execute that type of training in somewhat close proximity to civilians (the skiers)…
The list goes on of lessons learned, then forgotten only to be rediscovered. Glad they all walked away. Aside from the obvious need to have recognized the impending whiteout and to perform a go- around it begs the question I’ve always had about training accidents. Isn’t the purpose of a training exercise to go slow, evaluate conditions and make prudent adjustments? To stop and evaluate errors and communicate how to avoid them? As Ricky said to Lucy on many occasions….” youve got some ‘splainin’ to do”. It’s almost that the term ” training accident” should never really be needed to describe an event. Mission accidents are more understandable to me. Training is to demonstrate how to do it right and somebody in command has to make sure that happens.
We shouldn’t be criticizing these folks. The guard is no longer a safe haven from combat. They get deployed to the front lines over and over. This was a training exercise, best done when no one is shooting at you.
Correct and if one looks at the Air Force Civilian Service jobs boards for Title 32 (Guard ) vacant Guard mechanics openings you’ll get an idea about what the last 20 years has done to that job series and looking at the relatively newer Army aviators who are probably in the 30-40 age range and Guard getting their fair share of deployments after the Off Site Agreements 0f 1993 where 90-99% of Reserve Aviation units were transferred over to the Guard…Yeah, I’d be real careful about criticizing anyone these days in rotary aviation due to civilian or military OPTEMPO
Have a look at blancoliro’s review of the accident on YouTube. In addition to his commentary, there are observations made by former Army Aviation Instructor Pilots (based on the Twitter video of the accident) in the comments section that shed some light on what likely happened. The first ship in the formation of two may have not transitioned to a touchdown in a timely manner, which may have caused sustained white-out, which may have contributed to the accident. Regardless of the cause, my hat is off to military aviators and the job they do. This accident underscores how precise their flying has to be.
Expensive lesson to learn, don’t land together in white out (or dust out) conditions. NG plays a vital role and needs to continue to train to maintain readiness (just like FF).
Amazing everyone walked away.
Wheels on a slope with unpacked snow is a recipe for disaster.
Not to mention the white out condition caused by two main rotor wash down drafts thus causing loss of vertical reference. In addition to non HIGE
main rotor blade articulation.
Gotta wonder what their insurance deductible is…
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