A helicopter crashed near Joshimath in the Chamoli district of the Indian state of Uttarakhand on Friday 30 October, killing the pilot and all five passengers. The aircraft was an Airbus AS350 B3, registered VT-HCX and operated by the private company Trans Bharat Aviation. It took off from the helipad at the pilgrimage town of Badrinath at 13:14 local time, bound for the Sahastradhara helipad in Dehradun, the state capital. According to India's Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), it came down in a forested area near the village of Chai12.

Contact lost over the Joshimath valley

According to the Uttarakhand Civil Aviation Development Authority (UCADA), the state's aviation authority, communication with the helicopter was lost as it flew over the Joshimath valley. At the same time, the tracking system could no longer follow the aircraft34. The helicopter's last reported contact was near an Army post on Hathi Pahad, a mountain opposite Joshimath56.

The Chamoli district administration reported that smoke had been seen near Chai village3. The district disaster management officer, Nandkishore Joshi, said there were reports of a white object, suspected to be the helicopter, burning in the forest above the JP Dam56. At 14:21, the Joshimath police post was told by the local Sub-Divisional Magistrate that the helicopter had disappeared4. Around the same time, local authorities received reports of a suspected crash above Chai village7. The aircraft had crashed into a hillside near Chai, close to the JP Power House37.

Search hampered by rain and dense cloud

Teams from the Army, the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), the police, the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) and the district administration were sent to the crash site7. Additional helicopters were deployed to search from the air. Persistent rain and dense cloud cover made the search difficult56.

Chamoli District Magistrate Gaurav Kumar said the Army had informed the district administration of the crash, and confirmed that none of the six people on board had survived8. Chamoli Superintendent of Police Surjit Singh Panwar said the bodies had been found at the crash site97. Joint teams of the police, the SDRF and the Army recovered the bodies and began moving them from the hard-to-reach site to a location accessible by road2. The five passengers were from Bengaluru, in southern India410.

Rain and snow in the mountains

NDTV reported that the helicopter took off amid snowfall3. Rain and snow fell in several parts of Uttarakhand, and Kedarnath saw the season's first heavy snowfall. The Meteorological Centre in Dehradun expected rain to continue over the following days, particularly in the hill districts8. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) had issued an orange alert for Chamoli, warning of thunderstorms, lightning, hail and gusty winds of 40 to 50 km/h at isolated places97. The cause of the crash has not yet been established911.

DGCA and AAIB investigate

The DGCA has sent a team to Dehradun to carry out a preliminary and regulatory assessment of the accident12. According to a senior government source, India's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) will investigate the crash812. UCADA has grounded the entire Trans Bharat Aviation fleet as a precaution34. The Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, Pushkar Singh Dhami, has ordered a detailed investigation into the cause2.

A helicopter built for altitude

The AS350 B3 belongs to the Airbus Helicopters Ecureuil family, which also includes the H125. According to Airbus, helicopters in the H125/AS350 series are primarily used for high-performance operations in high and hot conditions. More than 7,200 members of the family have been delivered worldwide. In 2005, an AS350 B3 landed on the summit of Mount Everest at 8,848 metres, a record for the highest landing and take-off that still stands13.

Pilgrim flights in the Garhwal Himalaya

Badrinath is one of the four shrines of the Char Dham Yatra, a Hindu pilgrimage circuit in the Himalayas. The others are Yamunotri, Gangotri and Kedarnath3. Private operators fly pilgrims to the shrines by helicopter. In a report published this month, the AAIB describes the conditions under which these flights operate. Most of the shrines are in the hills, where the weather changes rapidly and sudden cloud or precipitation can develop. The flights are mostly single-pilot operations, so the pilot acts as both pilot flying and pilot monitoring and also has to pass on weather updates by radio. Most of these flights are made in smaller helicopters that carry neither a cockpit voice recorder nor a flight data recorder14.

A series of accidents in 2025

Several serious accidents happened on the pilgrimage routes in 2025. On 8 May 2025, a Bell 407 operated by Aero Trans Services crashed into a gorge near Gangnani in Uttarkashi district after its main rotor struck an overhead fibre-optic cable. Six people, including the pilot, were killed and one passenger was seriously injured115. On 15 June 2025, a Bell 407 operated by Aryan Aviation flew into terrain near Gaurikund on a shuttle flight from Kedarnath to Guptkashi. All seven people on board were killed14.

In its final report on that accident, dated 13 October 2026, the AAIB concludes that the pilot could not assess the fast-descending cloud on his flight path and continued the flight. He became disoriented in cloud, probably while attempting to turn back to Kedarnath, and the helicopter struck the slope. The AAIB lists as contributing factors the sudden build-up of cloud, the decision to continue on the same route and altitude, and the pilot's limited flying experience in the Kedarnath valley. The bureau also analysed the period from 2015 to 2025, in which it counted eight accidents and one serious incident in the Char Dham sector. Five of the accidents were fatal. In 2025 there were four accidents, all in May and June, two of them fatal. According to the AAIB, most of these accidents were linked to non-adherence to procedures in handling the helicopter and to crew decision-making in adverse conditions such as bad weather and high-altitude operations14.

Tighter rules after the Gaurikund crash

After the Gaurikund crash, India's Ministry of Civil Aviation immediately suspended Aryan Aviation's Char Dham operations. The ministry said that two Trans Bharat Aviation helicopters had also been found flying in similarly dangerous weather, and the licences of the two pilots involved were suspended for six months16. The state suspended helicopter services on the pilgrimage route for two days, and Chief Minister Dhami ordered a strict standard operating procedure and a common command and coordination centre in Dehradun17.

The DGCA had set out the rules for pilgrimage flights in an operations circular in 2023. On 11 September 2025, after that year's series of accidents, the circular was amended. The new version provides for a control centre at Sitapur to manage shuttle flights to Kedarnath. In its final report on the Gaurikund accident, the AAIB recommends that the DGCA consider requiring at least 50 hours of dual flying with an experienced pilot in hill operations before a pilot is released for single-pilot hill operations in the valley for the first time. It also recommends that radio communication between the control centre and the helicopters be recorded and that the DGCA oversee the centre14. Earlier this month, two helicopters on the Char Dham routes made emergency landings: one in Rudraprayag because of bad weather and another in Tehri after a technical issue56.