ATL01LA029 · Robert D. Wood VELOCITY XLFG
Robert D. Wood VELOCITY XLFG · Accident: airframe, component or system failure en route
From Sebastian Municipal Airport (X26) to Sebastian Municipal Airport (X26)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL01LA029
- 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
- Unknown
- 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
Robert D. Wood VELOCITY XLFG
- Aircraft type
- Robert D Wood VELOCITY XLFG
- Category
- Airplane
- 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
- N658SE
- Operator
- Brenden J. O'Riordan · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sebastian Municipal Airport (X26), Sebastian, FLTo Sebastian Municipal Airport (X26), Sebastian, FL
- 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
- En route · climb to cruise
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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
- Kit manufacturer › Miscellaneous, improper
- Miscellaneous, airframe › Composite material
- Miscellaneous, airframe › Delamination
- Wing, winglet › Flutter
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
This was the first test flight for this experimental airplane. As the airplane climbed through 2000 feet and accelerated to approximately 135 knots, the pilot reported that the left winglet began to flutter. When left rudder was applied, the flutter condition lessen, but when right rudder was applied the flutter became more severe. The pilot attempted an emergency landing in a field near the departure airport. Upon touchdown, the aircraft nosed over and came to rest inverted. Examination of the airplane disclosed errors in composite construction in the left and right wings, along with errors in bonding techniques for metal to fiber structures were revealed in the design of the aircraft.
Probable cause
The manufacturer's inadequate design of the winglet/rudder assembly, and inadequate bonding techniques for metal to fiber structures, which resulted in control surface flutter.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL01LA029
- Event ID
- 20010207X00410
- Case number
- ATL01LA029
- 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: 3782a32b67446db468c8d330b1230613a3e2f91b368dfb84aaecdc8ead30fe39; retrieved 2026-09-21T20:01:04.039Z.