Accident · 2003-01-08

What the record says

Event date

2003-01-08

Event type

Accident

Highest injury level

Fatal injury

Aircraft

Beech 1900D (N233YV)

Operating rule

Part 121

Operator

Air Methods Corp. Operator named in NTSB report

Operated by (per NTSB report)

AIR MIDWEST INC

Probable cause

the airplane's loss of pitch control during take-off. The loss of pitch control resulted from the incorrect rigging of the elevator system compounded by the airplane's aft center of gravity, which was substaintially aft of the certified aft limit. Contributing to the cause of the accident were (1) Air Midwest's lack of oversight of the work being performed at the Huntington, West Virginia, maintenance station; (2) Air Midwest's maintenance procedures and documentation; (3) Air Midwest's weight and balance program at the time of the accident; (4) the Raytheon Aerospace quality assurance inspector's failure to detect the incorrect rigging of the elevator control system; (5) the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) average weight assumptions in its weight and balance program guidance at the time of the accident; and (6) the FAA's lack of oversight of Air Midwest's maintenance program and its weight and balance program.

Flight crew

Flight-crew details for this event aren't in the NTSB database extract we hold (its coverage starts with 2008 events) — a gap in our data, not an absence of crew.