ERA23LA251 · Magniflight LLC M24 ORION PLUS
Magniflight LLC M24 ORION PLUS · Accident during initial climb
From Jack Edwards National Airport (JKA) to Dauphin Island Airport (4R9)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA23LA251
- 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
- Event fatalities
- Unknown
- 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
Magniflight LLC M24 ORION PLUS
- Aircraft type
- Magniflight M24
- 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
- N1777W
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Jack Edwards National Airport (JKA), Gulf Shores, ALTo Dauphin Island Airport (4R9), Dauphin Island, AL
- Aircraft age
- About 1 year (built 2022)
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Unknown or undetermined
- 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
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot of the gyroplane reported several lane warnings during the flight, which indicated possible disruptions to the fuel/ignition timing by the engine’s digital engine control unit (ECU). The ECU was comprised of two modules that worked in sync with each other to monitor numerous sensors throughout the engine. Although the pilot tried to reset the lane warning several times, the engine lost partial power. The pilot was unable to maintain altitude and made a forced landing in tall grass, during which the gyroplane rolled over and substantial damage. A postaccident examination and test run of the engine revealed no obvious mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have contributed to the accident. Data downloaded from the engine’s digital ECU and an electronic flight information system (EFIS) revealed that, at the time of the partial loss of engine power, the exhaust gas temperature (EGT) reading for the No. 4 cylinder dropped to levels indicating that combustion was no longer occurring within the cylinder. The loss of combustion in the No. 4 cylinder likely resulted in the partial power loss of the engine. The cause of the loss of combustion in the No. 4 cylinder could not be determined with the available engine ECU and EFIS data. Along with the engine data, the fact that the engine ran after the accident indicated there was likely an intermittent issue with the fuel/air delivery or the ignition to the No. 4 cylinder that could not be duplicated.
Probable cause
A partial loss of engine power due to a loss of combustion in the No. 4 cylinder for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA23LA251
- Event ID
- 20230531192273
- Case number
- ERA23LA251
- 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, cause areas. 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: 307b001253b4aabff0f8867ff8cc9000c6c0ee7735d49262a1f45bca5360c6a5; retrieved 2026-09-16T17:39:55.205Z.