CEN17LA267 · Robinson Helicopter R44 UNDESIGNAT
J R Aviation Robinson Helicopter R44 UNDESIGNAT · Accident: loss of tail rotor effectiveness while maneuvering
From Ireland, IN to Ireland, IN
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN17LA267
- 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 Helicopter R44 UNDESIGNAT
- 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
- N7224U
- Operator
- J R Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ireland, INTo Ireland, IN
- Aircraft age
- About 13 years (built 2004)
- 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 137: Agricultural
- 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
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The commercial pilot was conducting an agricultural aerial application flight. The pilot reported that the helicopter made an uncommanded right yaw during a turn. The pilot stated that he applied full left pedal to counter the yaw and that the helicopter centered briefly, but then the right yaw started again, which continued as the helicopter descended and impacted the ground.
Because the helicopter was likely operating out of ground effect at a high power setting, the uncommanded right yaw was likely the result of a loss of tail rotor effectiveness (LTE). According to Federal Aviation Administration guidance, the procedures to recover from LTE are early detection followed by applying forward cyclic to regain airspeed, applying right (not left) pedal to maintain rotor rpm, and reducing collective to reduce the high power demand on the tail rotor. On the basis of the available information, the pilot lost control of the helicopter when he responded improperly to the LTE by adding left pedal rather than by applying forward cyclic and right pedal and reducing collective.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to apply the proper procedures to recover from a loss of tail rotor effectiveness, which resulted in a loss of control during an aerial application turn.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN17LA267
- Event ID
- 20170713X22505
- Case number
- CEN17LA267
- 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, 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: 471372914420ad7b49c7b0a3a8822656ca8bc3e2f664d7c8f236bdb3120cf45c; retrieved 2026-09-16T05:32:19.819Z.