WPR25LA222 · Rotorsport UK Ltd ROTORSPORT UK CAVALO
Rotorsport UK Ltd ROTORSPORT UK CAVALO · Accident: loss of control on ground during takeoff
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR25LA222
- 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
Rotorsport UK Ltd ROTORSPORT UK CAVALO
- Aircraft type
- Rotorsport Uk CAVALO
- 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
- N630JM
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 5 years (built 2020)
- 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
- Takeoff
- 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 control on ground
- 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 oper/perf/capability
- 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 student pilot reported that during the takeoff ground roll on the runway, about 35 knots, the pilot moved the control stick slightly forward from the aft position and allowed the nose wheel to rise slightly above the surface, while he increased the throttle setting to 75%. As the gyroplane reached about 70 knots, it started to veer to the left and shudder, so the pilot slightly decreased the throttle setting. As the pilot approached the end of the runway, the pilot increased the throttle setting and maintained the control stick position. Subsequently, the gyroplane pitched up and rolled onto its right side. The gyroplane impacted the ground and slid to a stop on its right side within the runway safety area. The gyroplane sustained substantial damage to the drivetrain. The pilot reported that there were no preaccident mechanical failures or malfunctions with the gyroplane that would have precluded normal operation. The pilot added that during the takeoff, he should have held the aft position of the control stick to maintain the rotor RPM or aborted the takeoff earlier.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to maintain pitch control during takeoff, which resulted in an unintended liftoff from the runway and a subsequent loss of control.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR25LA222
- Event ID
- 20250725200631
- Case number
- WPR25LA222
- 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, 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: 69fe2558cc8562587162034915c96ab81803d686dc3ea2ff21e31eb595bd29de; retrieved 2026-09-16T20:08:14.380Z.