The 2006 Morecambe Bay Helicopter Crash was a fatal air incident that occurred on 27 December 2006 at approximately 18:40 GMT, while remote platform (Normally Unmanned Installations) crew were being transported from the Millom West via North Morecambe

gas platform An oil platform (or oil rig, offshore platform, oil production platform, and similar terms) is a large structure with facilities to extract and process petroleum and natural gas that lie in rock formations beneath the seabed. Many oil platfor ...

s to return them to the AP1, part of the Morecambe Field's Central Complex, situated approximately from the shoreline of

Morecambe Bay Morecambe Bay is a large estuary in northwest England, just to the south of the Lake District National Park. It is the largest expanse of intertidal mudflats and sand in the United Kingdom, covering a total area of . In 1974, the second larges ...

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancash ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. Rescue efforts recovered the bodies of six men, including those of the two pilots. The body of the seventh victim was never recovered.RNLI news item
Search for last body called off
– Morecambe Today – Obtained 24 January 2007. AAIB final report, section 1.2 "Injuries to persons", page 10. The helicopter was a Eurocopter AS365 Dauphin,

registration Register or registration may refer to: Arts entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), th ...

''G-BLUN'', owned by

CHC Helicopter CHC Helicopter is a Texas-based helicopter services company. CHC Helicopter maintains it global headquarters in Irving, Texas and operates more than 250 aircraft in 30 countries around the world. CHC's major international operating units are b ...

. The aircraft was contracted by Centrica, the company that manages the gas platform to which the helicopter was traveling. Initial rescue was undertaken by an emergency response rescue vessel Highland Sprite (E.R.R.V) and her two onboard fast rescue craft, and later by Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) rescue service operating out of nearby Lytham St Annes, and was coordinated by

HM Coastguard His Majesty's Coastguard (HMCG) is a section of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency responsible, through the Secretary of State for Transport to Parliament, for the initiation and co-ordination of all maritime search and rescue (SAR) within the ...

Investigation

The investigation into the crash started the same night as the accident. The flight data recorders were recovered on 17 January 2007 after severe weather hampered earlier recovery attempts. The storms also hampered efforts to find and recover those lost in the incident. Because offshore helicopter operations are so crucial to the day-to-day running of offshore platforms, the UK

Air Accidents Investigation Branch The Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) investigates civil aircraft accidents and serious incidents within the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and crown dependencies. It is also the Space Accident Investigation Authority (SAIA ...

(AAIB) felt it necessary to release a preliminary bulletin as soon as possible. Special Bulletin S1/2007 stated: "The conclusion of this preliminary examination is that there are no signs of pre-impact malfunction of any major mechanical components, including the tail rotor and its drive shaft." The formal report into the accident, released in October 2008, stated that "human factors" were the cause of the crash. The co-pilot, who was the handling pilot at the time, became disoriented in the dark night and poor weather conditions, and misjudged the approach path. He asked the commander for assistance, whereupon the commander took control of the helicopter. However, the transfer of control from co-pilot to commander was roughly four seconds after the co-pilot had initially noted that he was having difficulties but did not articulate this correctly. The report found that the transfer of control wasn't smooth enough due to the co-pilot not initially articulating his need clearly and that the commander wasn't "mentally primed to take control of the helicopter." The report concluded that:

References

External links

Air Accident Investigations Branch

BBC News

Centrica PLC

Royal National Lifeboat Institute

HM Coastguard
{{DEFAULTSORT:2006 Morecambe Bay Helicopter Crash Morecambe Bay helicopter Crash 2006 disasters in the United Kingdom Morecambe Bay Helicopter Crash Morecambe Bay helicopter Crash 2006 Morecambe Bay helicopter Crash 2006 Morecambe Bay December 2006 events in the United Kingdom