Stephens VORTEX N9261N

Summary

On 9 June 1998 at about 11:45 local time, a Stephens VORTEX registered N9261N was involved in an accident near Chinook, Montana, United States. One person was on board and one died. The aircraft was destroyed. The NTSB has published a probable cause for this accident; it is quoted in full below.

Date

9 June 1998 at 11:45

Classification

Accident

Location

Chinook, Montana, United States

Coordinates

48.4709, -109.2106

Aircraft

Stephens VORTEX

Registration

N9261N

Category

Gyrocraft

Engines

1

Operator

Not recorded

Operating rule

Part 91: General Aviation

Purpose of flight

Personal

Phase of flight

Not recorded

Aircraft damage

Destroyed

Weather

VMC

Light

Day

NTSB number

SEA98LA091

1 person died.

The pilot's failure to maintain aircraft control for an undetermined reason.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record. This site does not paraphrase or interpret it.

Read the full NTSB narrative

The private pilot, who was the builder of the gyroplane, had logged about 21 hours of flight time in gyroplanes, but did not have a gyroplane rating. A witness observed the gyroplane's departure and climb-out from the airport. When the gyroplane was approximately 400-500 feet AGL, the witness observed the nose pitch down slightly, then rapidly upward about 40 degrees, then down rapidly about 40 degrees below horizontal then back up as before. The witness said the gyroplane then seemed to fall nearly vertically downward to the ground, and speculated that there was some sort of catastrophic failure to the aircraft. FAA inspectors, however, found no evidence of inflight breakup, or a main rotor blade strike of the empennage.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record.