A New York man was killed when his helicopter crashed about 15 minutes into a flight near his home — because wasps built a nest inside the gas tank's vent tube.
Private pilot Gary Johnson, 65, was flying alone about 70 miles northeast of Syracuse when the chopper plunged into a marsh behind a commercial property he was developing, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
A neighbor across the street in West Carthage, New York, told investigators Johnson was hovering about 50 feet over the site when the craft's engine began to "sputter" before it fell out of the sky, the NTSB said in an investigation report released Aug. 2.
Johnson, of nearby Carthage, was seriously injured and rushed to a hospital where he died, the state police said following the crash of his Schweizer 269C helicopter late morning on July 27.
An inspection of the wreckage found 11 gallons of gas in the tank. But while the fuel was being drained, it "flowed sporadically...consistent with a lack of venting," according to the NTSB report.
"After all the fuel was drained, the metal fuel vent tube was examined with a borescope and a blockage was observed in the tube," NTSB Investigator in Charge Robert Gretz wrote.
"The vent tube was then removed from the tank and the debris was removed using compressed air and a metal wire. The debris was consistent with a mud dauber nest," he added.
Mud daubers are dark-colored wasps that use mud from puddles to build nests often found on the sides of buildings and equipment and inside unused machinery, according to the University of Maryland's College of Agriculture and Natural Resources.
Johnson, who kept his helicopter at his home, hadn't flown it for about three weeks before the deadly crash, a brother told NTSB investigators.
Johnson owned and operated a gas station and auto-repair shop in Carthage since 1976, and also owned several rental properties and recently bought a restaurant in nearby Wilna, according to his obituary.
