DEN05LA081 · Robinson R22 Beta
A Flight Above Robinson R22 Beta · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From St George Regional Airport (SGU) to St George Regional Airport (SGU)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN05LA081
- 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
Robinson R22 Beta
- 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
- N983KC
- Operator
- A Flight Above
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From St George Regional Airport (SGU), St. George, UTTo St George Regional Airport (SGU)
- 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
- Maneuvering
- 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 › Autorotation, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flight instructor said the student entered the autorotation and completed a 180-degree turn at an altitude of approximately 250 feet agl. There was a noticeable lateral vibration of the airframe and a rapid increase in descent rate. The instructor took control, advanced the throttle, and noticed that the rotor and engine rpm needles were "joined" just below 100 percent rpm. He said he did not understand why the helicopter had a descent rate greater than 1,500 feet per minute when the engine was at full power and rotor rpm was at 100 per cent rpm. Neither pilot heard the LOW ROTOR RPM warning. The instructor attempted to flare but there was insufficient time, and the helicopter impacted terrain and rolled over. Post-accident examination revealed no mechanical anomalies. There were dust devils in the area after the accident occurred.
Probable cause
the pilot's improper autorotation. A contributing factor was the flight instructor's inadequate supervision of the pilot.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN05LA081
- Event ID
- 20050525X00665
- Case number
- DEN05LA081
- 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: 3e88679697c79d868d657bc979efec3ad534ae8ce80f73c64d1c48bee7a45825; retrieved 2026-09-21T19:01:28.251Z.