LAX08IA032 · Robinson R22 Beta
Golden Eagle Enterprises Robinson R22 Beta · Incident: airframe, component or system failure during landing
From Fresno Yosemite International Airport (FAT) to Fresno Yosemite International Airport (FAT)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX08IA032
- 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
- Incident
- 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
- N805EH
- Operator
- Golden Eagle Enterprises
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Fresno Yosemite International Airport (FAT), Fresno, CATo Fresno Yosemite International Airport (FAT), Fresno, CA
- 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
- Landing · flare/touchdown
- 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
- None
Cause areas
- Rotorcraft flight control, tail rotor pedal › Failure
- Tail rotor/anti-torque control › Restricted
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Just as the helicopter touched down while performing a hovering autorotation, the certified flight instructor (CFI) heard a loud 'snap’ coming from the right side. The CFI took the controls from the student and attempted to neutralize the anti-torque pedals, but reported that they were stuck in place, with the right pedal in the forward position. He reduced the engine rpm’s to 75 percent, and attempted to move the pedals to no avail. At that point, he instructed the student to start the shutdown procedures. Following a normal shutdown, they exited the helicopter, and began to inspect the cause of the stuck anti-torque pedal. Both the CFI and student observed a broken metal structure adjacent to the restraining block that retains the anti-torque pedals. The CFI reported that it appeared to be the actual metal structure that the entire pedal assembly bolts to. The helicopter inspection revealed that the right-hand support bracket (part number A359-2) of the tail rotor control system had failed. The operator reported that the airframe had a total time of 13,000 hours. The helicopter manufacturer reported that they had been aware of other failed support brackets on helicopters with over 7,500 hours in service. As a result, the manufacturer increased the thickness of the support bracket material, and changed their overhaul procedures requiring replacement of the A359-1 and -2 support brackets at overhaul for all R22 and R44 models. The manufacturer also issued service bulletin (SB) SB-97 for the R22 and SB-63 for the R44, which require the addition of a safety tab on the older thinner support brackets.
Probable cause
Failure of the tail rotor system support bracket during landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX08IA032
- Event ID
- 20071211X01927
- Case number
- LAX08IA032
- 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, damage. 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: c5f86f710d6c0ecb99d0b095513a8064a204afdf98b88e77d7fb1e061689e323; retrieved 2026-09-22T03:15:00.594Z.