NYC08CA305 · Robinson R44 II
Frezo Financial Robinson R44 II · Accident: loss of tail rotor effectiveness while maneuvering
From Miami Executive Airport (TMB) to Marathon, FL
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC08CA305
- 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 R44 II
- Aircraft type
- Robinson R44
- 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
- N144SA
- Operator
- Frezo Financial
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Miami Executive Airport (TMB), Miami, FLTo Marathon, 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
- Maneuvering · hover
- Defining eventThe 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 tail rotor effectiveness
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
During a personal flight with three passengers onboard, the pilot decided to examine more closely some fish which the occupants spotted from the helicopter while they were about 320 feet above the water. The pilot turned the helicopter to the right 20 degrees and "settled forward into the wind" for hover at approximately 200 feet. The helicopter however, continued to turn to the right and the pilot was unable to arrest the turn. He then "made the call," to set the helicopter down and inflated the floats. Upon touchdown on the surface of the water the helicopter "flipped to the left" and became partially submerged. None of the four occupants were injured. The helicopter received substantial damage to the fuselage and tail boom. Examination of the helicopter by a Federal Aviation Administration inspector did not reveal any preimpact malfunctions. At the time of the accident, the helicopter was close to gross weight, the wind was 080 degrees at 5 knots, and the temperature was 31 degrees Celsius.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to control the helicopter while maneuvering, resulting in loss of tail rotor effectiveness.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC08CA305
- Event ID
- 20081007X55839
- Case number
- NYC08CA305
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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: 5deeae57bda26b02886082e57138d491a4b3c31d9f675ce5191b21da08fff79a; retrieved 2026-09-15T10:25:37.359Z.