CEN19LA106 · Robinson R22 BETA II
Robinson R22 BETA II · Accident en route
From Madill Municipal Airport (1F4) to Ardmore Municipal Airport (ADM)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN19LA106
- 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 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
- N7782H
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Madill Municipal Airport (1F4), Madill, OKTo Ardmore Municipal Airport (ADM), Ardmore, OK
- Aircraft age
- About 14 years (built 2005)
- 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
- En route
- 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
- Miscellaneous/other
- 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
- 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 pilot reported that about 10 minutes after takeoff, the helicopter was in level flight about 700 to 800 ft above ground level when the clutch actuator warning/caution light illuminated. He entered an autorotation intending to do a power recovery close to the ground. He indicated that, within a "short second or two" after the clutch light illuminated, he heard a "bang" and felt the helicopter shudder. He continued the autorotation and landed on rough terrain. The helicopter rolled onto its left side and sustained substantial damage to the tail boom, main rotor, and fuselage. The examination of the helicopter revealed that the two double V-belts had separated from the upper sheave and that there was a field repair on the wire connections at the clutch actuator fuse holder. The terminals were wrapped in tape and a wire tie. When the wire tie and tape were removed, the fuse holder terminal fell and fractured from the holder, and the wires separated from the solder on the terminal. The extension limiter was found at 1.65 inches, which is the maximum extension limit; the normal range was 1.1 to 1.3 inches. The improper repair of the clutch actuator fuse holder likely caused the loose condition of the V-belts, which resulted in V-belt failure and the loss of power to the helicopter's rotor system, subsequent autorotation, and forced landing.
Probable cause
The failure of the V-belts due to improper maintenance, which resulted in the loss of power to the helicopter's rotor system and subsequent forced landing on rough terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN19LA106
- Event ID
- 20190320X13153
- Case number
- CEN19LA106
- 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: 820603696d4e5119193b86e66f5da5a80a38afc76ad821408198f5c1eea33f72; retrieved 2026-09-16T08:40:38.778Z.