The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has officially concluded that the helicopter crash which claimed the lives of former Access Holdings CEO Herbert Wigwe, his wife Doreen, their son Chizi, and three others, was the result of pilot error compounded by mechanical failure and operator negligence.
Truth Live News gathered from the final report released on Wednesday, that the NTSB identified spatial disorientation as the immediate cause of the crash. The pilot was flying under Visual Flight Rules (VFR) but continued into weather conditions that required Instrument Flight Rules (IFR), a critical misjudgment that ultimately led to the fatal accident.
According to the report, “The pilot’s decision to continue the visual flight rules flight into instrument meteorological conditions, which resulted in the pilot’s spatial disorientation and loss of control,” was the primary factor behind the tragedy.
Investigators stated that the pilot likely became disoriented while navigating through low-visibility weather conditions, causing him to lose control of the helicopter. Contributing to this loss of control was the failure of a key safety device—the radar altimeter—which was not operational at the time of the flight. Despite being aware of the malfunction, both the pilot and the helicopter company’s Director of Maintenance (DOM) allowed the flight to proceed.
A company mechanic had attempted to repair the radar altimeter but was unsuccessful. “A company mechanic performed some troubleshooting… however, he was unable to rectify the issue, and the radar altimeter remained non-functional,” the report confirmed.
The NTSB report also criticized the helicopter operator for what it described as “inadequate oversight of its safety management processes.” This included poor pre-flight risk assessments, incomplete documentation of maintenance issues, and a failure to enforce compliance with established safety protocols. Compounding the operator’s lapses was a breakdown in communication: although the pilot and the company’s flight follower exchanged messages after picking up the charter passengers, they failed to address the radar altimeter malfunction or discuss worsening weather conditions.
“The pilot and the company’s flight follower exchanged messages, but did not discuss the status of the radar altimeter or weather conditions,” the report added.
Furthermore, it was revealed that the pilot had already informed maintenance personnel about the faulty radar altimeter before the flight. “The mechanic reported that the pilot and the DOM were aware that the radar altimeter was not functioning, yet they departed at 1822 on the positioning flight to pick up the passengers,” the NTSB stated.
The tragic crash occurred on February 9, 2024, near the California-Nevada border. All six people on board the Airbus Helicopters EC130B4, registered as N130CZ, died in the incident. Among them were Wigwe, his wife and son, and Abimbola Ogunbanjo, the former Chairman of the Nigerian Exchange Group.
The findings have sparked renewed criticism of aviation safety protocols and prompted fresh calls for stricter oversight of flight operations, both in the United States and Nigeria.