NYC helicopter that plunged into Hudson River had mechanical issue months before fatal wreck

The New York City chopper that crashed into nan Hudson River had a mechanical rumor months earlier it collapsed isolated midair and killed each six onboard, including a family of visitors visiting from Spain, according to records.

The ill-fated Bell206L-4 LongRanger IV aircraft, owned and operated by New York Helicopter, knowledgeable a mechanical rumor pinch its transmission assembly past September, according to Federal Aviation Administration data.

Records show nan doomed chopper was built successful 2004 and had already logged 12,728 hours of formation clip erstwhile it was forced into repair.

An investigation is underway to find what caused nan craft to driblet retired of nan entity and plunge into nan river. The probe will comb done nan pilot’s experience, nan still-incomplete wreckage, and nan Big Apple institution that runs nan sightseeing tours.

Investigators will besides reappraisal nan attraction activity that was done connected nan doomed aircraft, including nan completion of two caller information airworthiness directives nan FAA issued connected Bell 206L exemplary helicopters.

The national agency issued nan first directive successful December 2022 and called for nan inspection and imaginable replacement of nan models’ main rotor blades owed to “delamination” — an rumor pinch nan soul layers of nan leaf separating owed to worldly fatigue, harm aliases different defects. 

The problem, if not fixed, could perchance origin nan rotor leaf to fail.

A 2nd directive, issued successful May 2023, required nan testing and imaginable replacement of tail rotor shafts connected 8 models, including nan 1 progressive successful Thursday’s deadly wreck, according to nan FAA, which issued nan alert aft a chopper mislaid a tail-rotor thrust owed to a associated failure. 

The rotors connected nan doomed craft are still missing, National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy said Friday. NYPD divers are still connected nan hunt for respective mangled pieces of nan craft.

Chilling footage captured nan craft crumbling midair earlier it plunged into nan river, pinch astatine slightest 1 rotor still spinning arsenic different parts of nan chopper splashed down successful various directions.

The chopper took disconnected from Manhattan’s Downtown Skyport astatine astir 1:50 p.m., pinch Siemens executive Agustin Escober, his wife, Mercè Camprubí Montal, and their 3 young children — Augustin, 10, Mercedes, 8, and Victor, 4 — successful tow.

The family, who hailed from Barcelona, Spain, were flown by Sean Johnson, 36, a Navy SEAL seasoned who precocious moved to nan Big Apple for his still-young aviation career. 

The chopper collapsed astir 25 minutes into its aerial tour, Homendy said. 

But this isn’t nan first time nan circuit institution has seen 1 of its craft successful nan aforesaid murky waters.  

A Bell 206 chopper carrying 4 Swedish visitors crashed landed successful nan Hudson erstwhile nan craft mislaid powerfulness successful June 2013 – pinch nan aviator and 4 family members miraculously surviving.

New York Helicopter CEO Michael Roth told nan Wall Street Journal astatine nan clip that nan chopper underwent regular daily inspections but had “no hint why” nan craft malfunctioned mid-flight.

Now, 12 years later, Roth again has “no clue” what happened. 

“I’m perfectly devastated,” Roth told The Post aft nan deadly crash.

“The only point I cognize by watching a video of nan chopper falling down, that nan main rotor blades weren’t connected nan helicopter. And I haven’t seen thing for illustration that successful my 30 years being successful business, successful nan chopper business,” he continued.

“The only point I could conjecture — I sewage nary hint — is that it either had a vertebrate onslaught aliases nan main rotor blades failed. I person nary clue. I don’t know. This is horrific. But you gotta retrieve something, these are machines and they break.”

The chopper was issued an airworthiness certificate successful 2016 that was valid done 2029, records show.

With Post wires