Bristow Helicopters Flight 56C

Bristow Helicopters

Industry	Aviation
Founded	1974
Headquarters	Aberdeen , United Kingdom

Bristow Helicopters Flight 56C operated a route between Aberdeen and the Brae Alpha oil platform located in the North Sea. On 19 January 1995, the Eurocopter AS332L Super Puma helicopter, bearing the registration G-TIGK and named Cullen, was hit by lightning while transporting 16 oilfield workers to the Brae site. Remarkably, all 18 individuals on board survived the incident.

Crew

Cedric Roberts, the flight commander aged 44, had accumulated over 9,600 flight hours with Bristow Helicopters since beginning in 1974. The first officer, Lionel Sole, aged 39, had logged more than 3,100 flight hours and had been part of Bristow since 1990.

Accident

During the flight, adverse weather conditions were encountered, and a lightning strike caused significant damage to the tail rotor. The helicopter briefly continued flying until a control check conducted by the copilot resulted in total tail rotor failure. This forced an emergency autorotation landing into turbulent sea waters. The deployment of emergency flotation equipment allowed all occupants to evacuate onto a life raft safely. Despite challenging circumstances, every passenger and crew member was successfully rescued by the standby vessel named Grampian Freedom.

The lightning strike was likely an isolated event caused by passage through storm clouds. The subsequent investigation revealed weaknesses in the carbon fibre composite rotor blades, which incorporated brass strips that made them vulnerable to lightning damage and possible structural failure.

In popular culture

The story of Flight 56C was dramatized in "Helicopter Down," an episode from Season 3 (2005) of the Canadian television series Mayday, also known as Air Emergency and Air Disasters in the United States and Air Crash Investigation internationally.

See also

Notable helicopter accidents in the North Sea region include:

• 1986 British International Helicopters Chinook crash
• Helikopter Service Flight 451 (1997)
• Bond Offshore Helicopters Flight 85N (2009)
• CHC Helikopter Service Flight 241 (2016)

External links

• CAA progress report for 1998 (p. 29)
• CAA progress report for 1997 (p. 26)
• Aviation Safety Network