WPR09FA104 · Robinson Helicopter R22 BETA II
Orbic Helicopters Sales & Service At Camarillo Robinson Helicopter R22 BETA II · Accident: part(s) separation from aircraft while maneuvering
From Camarillo International Airport (CMA) to Camarillo International Airport (CMA)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR09FA104
- 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
Robinson Helicopter R22 BETA II
- 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
- N4160A
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Camarillo International Airport (CMA), Camarillo, CATo Camarillo International Airport (CMA), Camarillo, 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
- Maneuvering
- 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
- Part(s) separation from aircraft
- 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 propeller/rotor
- Aircraft › Aircraft structures
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The operator reported that the pilot had rented the helicopter for a personal proficiency flight to the local practice area. No eyewitnesses to the accident sequence were located. Documentation of the accident site noted that pieces of the tailcone, tailrotor flight controls, and tailrotor driveshaft were located about 900 feet away from the main wreckage at a location consistent with the main rotor blade contacting the tailcone while in flight. Inspection of the outboard end of the main rotor blades found red scuff marks, which appeared to match the red “Danger” decal on the tailcone. Evidence of black scuff marks consistent with the paint scheme of the main rotor blades were also noted on pieces of the tailcone. During the postaccident examination of the airframe and control system, there was no evidence found that would explain the main rotor disc's divergence from the normal plane of rotation and its subsequent contact with the tailboom. No evidence of a preimpact mechanical malfunction was observed during the examination of the engine, the airframe, or control systems.
Probable cause
An in-flight break-up while maneuvering as a result of the main rotor blades diverging from the normal plane of rotation and severing the tailboom. The underlying reason for the main rotor divergence could not be determined.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR09FA104
- Event ID
- 20090201X10015
- Case number
- WPR09FA104
- 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: 4f4a3148dfd4b8e5e19e87853f412e98489adb5233d666d2aa69a018095688c3; retrieved 2026-09-13T19:56:25.101Z.