Bell 206B II crash near off Christmas Island, Line Islands, Kiribati

The helicopter was working as a fish spotting aircraft from the helipad of the fishing vessel Majestic Sun, off Christmas Island. The pilot boarded for takeoff while the mechanic removed the tie downs. One tie down was still attached when he lifted, and the helicopter rolled to the right and struck the helipad, sustaining substantial damage to the main rotor, the mast and the tail boom. The pilot, a 60 year old South Korean national and the only person on board, was uninjured. The NTSB determined the probable cause to be the pilot's inadequate preflight inspection and the maintenance crew's failure to remove the tie down. Two dates are in circulation: the NTSB filed the accident as 20 October 2015 on US time, while the operator recorded it as 21 October at 09:00 local. Kiritimati keeps UTC+14, so the local date is the one used here. The aircraft was owned by Ocean Care Inc and flown under Part 91 for the South Korean company Silla Co. Coordinates are approximate to Christmas Island.