DFW07FA071 · Stevens KB-2
Stevens KB-2 · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From F29 · Oklahoma City, OK to Oklahoma City, OK
Event
- NTSB case
- DFW07FA071
- 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
- 1 · 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
Stevens KB-2
- Aircraft type
- Stevens KB-2
- Category
- Gyroplane
- 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
- N6KT
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From F29 · Oklahoma City, OKTo Oklahoma City, OK
- 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 downwind
- 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 › Aircraft control, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The amateur built gyroplane was flying on the downwind leg for runway 17L, approximately 250 feet downwind from a group of deciduous trees and a row of aircraft hangars, while at an estimated altitude of 100-150 feet above ground level (agl). Near the midfield point, the gyroplane suddenly pitched to a nose down angle of approximately 60 degrees and subsequently impacted the ground. About 30 minutes earlier, a weather observation facility located 12 nautical miles southeast from the site of the accident was reporting, wind from 190 degrees at 21 knots gusting to 24 knots. Inspection of the wreckage did not reveal any mechanical failure/malfunction which would have resulted in the loss of control; however, the investigation did reveal that this was the pilot's first flight after removing the gyroplane's horizontal stabilizer.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain control of the gyroplane while in the traffic pattern. Contributing to the accident was the high wind with terrain induced turbulence and the absence of the gyroplane's horizontal stabilizer.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DFW07FA071
- Event ID
- 20070221X00207
- Case number
- DFW07FA071
- 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, coordinates. 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: 14b878424446c6c12b572ea9a90a32ec82e6b5dcec6c3ec2c6b7b969f41ee1c4; retrieved 2026-09-20T16:50:12.915Z.