A small plane slammed into the back of a hovering Pennsylvania State Police helicopter at Carlisle Airport on Wednesday evening, killing the plane's pilot and injuring two troopers who had to fight their way out of the wreckage. The Cessna 150 struck the Bell 407 helicopter from behind as the helicopter crew conducted routine training near the runway, according to state police, and the collision reduced the helicopter to a mangled, inverted hulk on the grass beside the airfield.
Acting Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Lt. Col. George Bivens said the helicopter was hovering just a few feet off the ground when the Cessna approached from behind, lined up with the runway, and then suddenly veered hard to the right into the helicopter's rear, according to the CBS News. State police said the helicopter pilots had no line of sight to see the Cessna coming, meaning they never had a chance to react before impact. The crash happened around 7:50 p.m. near the airport in Carlisle, according to 6abc Philadelphia.
The Federal Aviation Administration identified the aircraft involved as a Bell 407 helicopter and a Cessna 150 airplane, per 6abc's reporting. The helicopter was carrying two people, while the number of people aboard the Cessna was not immediately known in the hours after the crash, though officials later said the pilot was believed to be its sole occupant.
Helicopter Rolled Inverted as Trooper Kicked Out Window
The force of the crash sheared off the Bell 407's main rotor blades and tail boom, causing the aircraft to flip and roll onto its side, the report notes. One trapped trooper kicked out a window to free himself and then helped pull his fellow pilot from the wreckage, per the same account from TribLIVE's coverage of the crash. Debris from the impact was scattered across the grass adjacent to the runway.
Cumberland County Coroner Charles Hall confirmed his office responded to the scene, according to reporting cited by 6abc. Governor Josh Shapiro said he had been briefed on the crash and was heading to Carlisle, and he later confirmed publicly that the collision involved a Pennsylvania State Police aircraft. “Lori and I are praying,” Shapiro said, according to 6abc, asking Pennsylvanians to join him and his wife in doing the same. As of the initial reporting, authorities had not released details on the extent of the troopers' injuries; the CBS News has since reported both troopers were treated for non-life-threatening injuries.
No Control Tower, Just a Shared Radio Channel
Carlisle Airport, listed under identifier N94, is a non-towered public general aviation field with a single 4,008-foot runway, where pilots coordinate landings and takeoffs over a shared common radio frequency instead of relying on air traffic controllers, per CNN. That setup depends on pilots visually spotting and avoiding one another rather than getting direction from a tower. Following the collision, the FAA issued a Notice to Air Missions closing the airport's runway to fixed-wing traffic while crash investigators processed the wreckage, according to the South Philly Review.
Life Lion medical helicopters, which keep an operational base directly at Carlisle Airport, launched emergency transport flights to carry the injured troopers to regional trauma centers, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Local emergency units arrived within minutes of 911 dispatch calls, the outlet reported. Residents from a nearby townhome community said they heard a loud explosion and saw smoke rising over the airfield; two neighbors reportedly jumped the airport fence to help injured personnel before first responders arrived. The Post-Gazette noted that weather and visibility were clear at the time of the crash.
Statewide Aviation Fleet and a Federal Investigation Ahead
The Pennsylvania State Police Aviation Section operates a statewide fleet of six Bell 407GX helicopters and several fixed-wing aircraft spread across six regional patrol units, with the helicopter involved in Wednesday's crash assigned to the agency's Harrisburg base. The section normally handles search-and-rescue and tactical support missions.
Both the FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board have opened a joint investigation into the collision, which the NTSB has officially classified as a midair collision, CNN reported. Federal officials estimate that this type of investigation typically takes 12 to 24 months to produce a final probable cause report. Investigators still have not said why the Cessna pilot veered into the helicopter's path or whether any radio announcements were made or heard on the shared frequency before impact.
Safety data compiled by the AOPA Air Safety Institute shows that roughly 78 percent of general aviation midair collisions near airport traffic patterns happen at non-towered airfields like Carlisle, with the approach and maneuvering phases of flight posing the highest risk. Most such collisions occur within 10 miles of an airport, according to the organization's research, underscoring how tight the margins can be at fields that rely on pilots seeing and avoiding each other rather than a controller directing traffic.
