FTW01LA039 · Robinson R22
Robinson R22 · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From Mesquite Metro Airport (HQZ) to Garland/Dfw Heloplex Heliport (T57)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW01LA039
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Robinson R22
- Aircraft type
- Robinson R22
- Category
- Helicopter
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N7187W
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Mesquite Metro Airport (HQZ), Mesquite, TXTo Garland/Dfw Heloplex Heliport (T57), Garland, TX
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Approach · VFR pattern final
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Loss of control in flight
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Supervision, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
While en route at 1,000 feet agl, the instructor pilot gave the student a simulated engine failure over a field and instructed the student to make an autorotation with a power recovery. The student pilot made a gradual 360-degree turn while descending to the field. The instructor stated that the student leveled the helicopter on final approach. The instructor made one last search for obstacles, and looked back into the cockpit to find the airspeed was at 45 knots and the main rotor RPM was at the bottom of the green arc (approximately 97%). The helicopter was approximately 100 feet agl when the instructor pilot took over control of the helicopter and attempted a 'high power recovery.' He rolled on the throttle, pulled up on the collective, felt a 'slight hesitation,' and the helicopter then 'snapped to the right.' At that time, the instructor applied left pedal and heard the low rotor RPM warning horn. The instructor stated that he thought that the helicopter did not touch down level due to the rotation to the right. The helicopter touched down in the field, 'hopped to the right approximately 40 degrees' and then became airborne again. The instructor stated that he thought that he still had either full throttle applied to the engine and/or the collective raised. As the helicopter became airborne, it rotated 360 degrees to the right, contacted the ground with the tail rotor, then the right skid. Subsequently, the helicopter rolled over onto its right side.
Probable cause
The flight instructor's inadequate supervision of his student and his failure to maintain control of the helicopter. Factors were the student pilot allowing the airspeed and main rotor RPM to get too low during the simulated emergency.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW01LA039
- Event ID
- 20001226X45485
- Case number
- FTW01LA039
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 25ea9ac7635ffd8ecbe7afc47e2c6232abc19e6c5de309b2afa11e0d267278ea; retrieved 2026-09-22T12:16:39.234Z.