Bell 206B accident near Round Top, Texas, April 2, 1998
On April 2, 1998 at about 2:17 pm local time, a Bell 206B (helicopter), registered N7734A, was destroyed in an accident near Round Top, Texas. It was a personal flight under general aviation rules (Part 91). 1 person was killed. The weather was instrument conditions (cloud, fog or low visibility).
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The NTSB's probable cause their words, unchanged
The pilot's attempted VFR flight into instrument meteorological conditions. Contributing factors were fog, low ceilings, and trees.
Source: NTSB aviation accident database, copy made September 29, 2026. Docket and reports at the NTSB.
What the record shows
- Date
- April 2, 1998 · about 2:17 pm local time
- Place
- Round Top, Texas · map
- Type
- Accident
- Injuries
- 1 person was killed.
- Weather
- instrument conditions (cloud, fog or low visibility)
- Aircraft
- Bell 206B · all 206Bs on the register
- Registration
- N7734A · registry record · serial 1768
- Damage
- Destroyed
- Flight
- Personal flight · general aviation rules (Part 91)
The NTSB's narrative final · quoted from the NTSB record
The non-instrument rated private helicopter pilot encountered fog and low ceilings while en route on a 132 mile VFR cross country flight. Witnesses near the accident site reported observing the helicopter in a nose down attitude and hearing the sound of impact with trees. Visibility in the vicinity of the accident site was reported by several witnesses to be as low as 100 feet and as high as 1/4 of a mile. The ceiling was obscured due to fog. Residents in the area reported that fog has a tendency to form that time of the year around sunrise. Physical evidence and signatures at the accident site indicate that the helicopter impacted the trees and terrain in a 45 degree nose low attitude in a slight right turn. The accident occurred at 0807 local time and sunrise occurred at 0619. The pilot had accumulated a total of 187 flight hours. No evidence of pre-impact mechanical failure or malfunction was observed at the accident site. No anomalies were found during the investigation that could have prevented normal flight operation.
The NTSB's narratives can run to many pages; this is the opening. Read the full report at the NTSB.
About this page
Everything above comes from the NTSB's public accident database and is rewritten in plain English only where the NTSB used codes; the probable cause and narrative are the NTSB's own words. This site never names pilots, passengers or anyone else involved. A preliminary report describes what is known soon after the event and can change; the final report, with the probable cause, usually follows one to two years later and this page is refreshed when it does. Case number FTW98FA167.