On March 10, 2015, a Louisiana Army National Guard helicopter crashed into Santa Rosa Sound just east of Pensacola, Florida, U.S., while on a nighttime training mission from Hulbert Field. Both pilots and nine other National Guard personnel were killed. The investigation by the Louisiana Army National Guard and U.S. Special Operations Command found no signs of mechanical problems with the aircraft, and investigators concluded that the pilots experienced spatial disorientation due to the fog that covered the area. The two experienced pilots lost control of the aircraft while it was in a normal horizontal flight attitude.
How can competent pilots suddenly begin to “mishandle” an aircraft so much that it crashes? Simply put, when spatial disorientation occurs, the mind can play tricks on you and make you believe things that are not real. According to the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, “spatial disorientation [SD] specifically refers to the lack of orientation with regard to …
