Two Killed in Hughes 369D Helicopter Crash Near Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania
The NTSB accident record lists two aboard, two fatalities and the helicopter destroyed; the cause has not been determined.
By AI ReporterUpdated Aug 7, 2026, 9:54 a.m. ET
people aboard a helicopter were killed when it crashed near Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, at about 6:02 p.m. local time on September 11, 2025, according to the National Transportation Safety Board accident record. The record lists people on board and fatalities, and states the aircraft was destroyed. The investigation is open and this account is developing.
The NTSB record identifies the aircraft as a , registration , and classifies the flight as a Part 133 rotorcraft external-load operation. It names the operator as . Aircraft registry records list the type as a single-engine turboprop helicopter, serial number 811024D, registered in the United States, with the registered owner recorded as ; the owner of record is not necessarily the operator of the flight, the pilot, or otherwise connected to it. A search of the open web, directories and registry-derived listings found no records describing an aviation organisation of that name at or near Jim Thorpe, Carbon County.
The cause has not been determined. The National Transportation Safety Board is the investigating body. Weather observed at Hazleton Municipal Airport (KHZL), 15.9 miles away and 7 minutes from the reported time of the accident, recorded calm wind, 10 statute miles visibility and clear skies. That is an instrument reading and not a statement about what happened.
Geographic reference data places Jim Thorpe in Carbon County, Pennsylvania, at a settlement elevation of 604 ft, 3.9 miles SSW of Jake Arner Memorial Airport (K22N) and 5.0 miles SE of Sunny Rest Airport (8PA8); that locates the town, not the accident site, which the record does not specify more precisely.
As a matter of public record, NTSB files list three other cases involving the same owner or operator: a Hughes (MD Helicopters) 369, N500MZ, at Adair, Iowa on March 17, 2022 (CEN22LA146); a , N138WH, at Sulphur, Louisiana on November 7, 2017 (CEN18LA026), with fatalities; and an MD Helicopters 369E, N765WH, at Thomas, West Virginia on October 30, 2010 (ERA11FA042), with one fatality. The NTSB database, which begins in 2008, contains 43 other cases involving the , of which 11 involved a fatality. Those records say nothing about the cause of this accident.
Was this report accurate and useful?
Reference data
From aircraft and geographic registries, not from the news sources. Registry records can be out of date, and describe the aircraft and the place only — they say nothing about what happened.
Registration
N5072F
Type
Hughes 369D — single-engine turboprop helicopter
Registered owner
Winco IncThe owner of record is not necessarily the operator, the pilot, or otherwise connected to the flight.
Terrain elevation
604 ft
Nearest aerodrome
3.9 miles NNE of Jake Arner Memorial Airport (K22N)
Sources
No sources recorded.
Revision history
Version 27 Aug 2026, 13:54current
Added a paragraph of geographic reference data locating Jim Thorpe and nearby aerodromes, and consolidated the investigation and weather paragraphs.
Version 15 Aug 2026, 20:56
First published.
How we work
This site models an investigative reporter rather than a wire desk. The aim is the most complete, accurate and timely account we can assemble — all three, not a trade between them. Reports go out within minutes of the coverage they are built from, carrying context a newsroom would otherwise need a day and a records request to gather: what has happened at this place before, what the operator’s record is, which aircraft it actually was.
Reports are built from primary sources — accident and court records, official registries, weather observations, agency statements — and from reputable news organisations, each named where their reporting is used. Facts are extracted before anything is written, and every one must be supported by a quotation found in the source itself; the model that writes the report is given only those verified facts and never sees the article, so it cannot introduce a detail no source stated.
Where sources disagree we publish the disagreement, attributed, rather than picking a figure. Where a fact comes from a record rather than a reporter, we say so, and the language matches: an instrument reading is never described as something anyone confirmed. Some things are deliberately withheld — a suspect is not named until an agency names them on the record, victims until families or officials release them — and corrections appear as visible revisions, never as silent edits.
None of that makes a report true. A quotation check proves a source said something, not that it was right, and an automated system can be confidently wrong in ways the checks do not catch. If something here is wrong, the feedback above is how it gets found. The full methodology, including what we refuse to publish.