ERA09LA438 · Christopher John P CHR-1
Christopher John P CHR-1 · Accident: loss of engine power (total) on approach
From Central Maine/Norridgewock Airport (OWK) to Central Maine/Norridgewock Airport (OWK)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA09LA438
- 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
Christopher John P CHR-1
- Aircraft type
- Christopher John CHR-1
- 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
- N179TC
- Operator
- Christopher John P
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Central Maine/Norridgewock Airport (OWK), Norridgewock, METo Central Maine/Norridgewock Airport (OWK), Norridgewock, ME
- 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
- 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 engine power (total)
- 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 power plant
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot of the gyroplane stated that after takeoff he climbed to pattern altitude and, while on downwind and abeam the runway numbers, he heard a “pop and then experienced a terrible, violent vibration, seemingly catastrophic in nature. There was no power, but the engine was still running.” As he was conducting a forced landing in rough terrain, the wheel and then the main rotor dug into the ground, causing the ship to roll onto its side. The main rotor, mast, landing gear, and horizontal stabilizer sustained damage. Further examination by the pilot revealed that the engine crankshaft was broken near the No. 1 cylinder. The pistons of the non-certified engine had been replaced about 10 operational hours earlier.
Probable cause
A loss of engine power due to a broken crankshaft for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA09LA438
- Event ID
- 20090804X11713
- Case number
- ERA09LA438
- 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: 4281871dc06d3ff5c748b72623f89397b081f223f44685e01e053cd5af158cf9; retrieved 2026-09-15T12:09:12.549Z.