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LAX07CA063 · Belcher Helicycle

23 Dec 2006 · Boulder City, NV, United States

Belcher Helicycle · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) while maneuvering

From Jean Airport (0L7) to 61B · Boulder City, NV

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Event

NTSB case
LAX07CA063
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

Belcher Helicycle

Aircraft type
Belcher HELICYCLE
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
N6912B
Operator
Unknown
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Jean Airport (0L7), Jean, NVTo 61B · Boulder City, NV
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 · hover in ground effect
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
Total loss of engine power (mechanical 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

  • Fuel system, line › Fatigue
  • Fuel system, line › Separation

Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

The amateur-built experimental helicopter landed hard following a loss of engine power while in a 6-foot hover. The pilot said the helicopter was equipped with a 150-horsepower turbo shaft engine. The engine was originally developed for a military application and the manufacturer has since introduced it for sale to amateur builders. The pilot reported that he was in a hover 6 feet above the taxiway after landing when the engine lost power. He attempted a hovering autorotation; however, the helicopter landed hard. He examined the engine and related systems. He said the loss of power was due to a fractured and separated solid fuel line that went from the fuel manifold to one of the injectors. He stated that the crack was near a joint in the line and appeared to be from fatigue.

Probable cause

a loss of engine power due to a fractured fuel line.

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record LAX07CA063
Event ID
20070109X00029
Case number
LAX07CA063
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: ca936a06b1f229c73c6f647c320ab096daded56cc9347946d85bebeae791dcc4; retrieved 2026-09-22T04:06:57.700Z.