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FAA Rotorcraft Monthly Accident Briefing - April

Lee Roskop
May 6, 2022
2 min read

Updated: Jan 23, 2023

Attached is the Rotorcraft Monthly Accident Briefing for April 2022 (7th month of FY22). Announcements: - This will be the last month of including the legacy PowerPoint summary. Future distribution will include only the pdf of the new rotorcraft accident dashboard. **You may now access the information directly anytime at the following NEW FAA public site, Rotorcraft Accident Dashboard. The data is updated by Tuesday of each week.** Monthly Summary Totals: 13 accidents, 2 fatal accidents, 3 fatalities - Five of the 13 accidents during April involved Aerial Application. The remaining eight involved Personal/Private (3), Instructional/Training (3), and Helicopter Air Ambulance (2). - The April accident total tied for the second highest April in the last 10 years and tied for third highest the last 20 years. Cumulative FY22 Summary, Oct-Apr FY22, Totals: 65 accidents, 15 fatal accidents, 26 fatalities Accidents: - The Oct-Apr estimated accident rate was 3.91 per 100K hours. - Compared to the same time period in FY21, the FY22 Oct-Apr accident rate was up 26%. Compared to the 5 year average for the same time frame it was up 18%. - From an industry sector standpoint, Aerial Application moved from outside the top 5 from Oct-Mar (8% of all accidents) and into the third highest percentage of accidents for Oct-Apr (14% of all accidents). Fatal Accidents: - The Oct-Apr estimated fatal accident rate was 0.9 per 100K hours, the second consecutive month with a slight decrease (down from 0.93 Oct-Mar). - Compared to the same time period in FY21, the FY22 Oct-Apr fatal accident rate was up 81%. Compared to the 5 year average for the same time frame it was up 24%. - The count of 15 fatal accidents through 7 months of FY22 are tied for 2nd highest over both the last 10 years and last 15 years. - Fifteen consecutive months have now passed with at least 1 fatal rotorcraft accident each month. - This is only the third time since FY01 that the FY has started with a fatal accident in 7 consecutive months. The last time was FY13 (zero months without a fatal accident). Prior to that, it was FY06 where the first month without a fatal accident did not occur until July. - 60% of the fatal accidents so far in the FY involved either Personal/Private (40%) or Instructional/Training (20%). All other fatal accidents were spread across six different industry sectors, each with 1 event. Fatalities: - The FY22 estimated fatality rate through April was 1.56 per 100K hours. U.S. Helicopter Safety Team (USHST) Calendar Year Metrics - Goal: Reduce the 5 year average fatal accident rate to 0.55 per 100K hours by 2025. The USHST uses the 5 year average fatal accident rate from CYs 2014-2018 (0.62 per 100K hours) as their baseline for measurement. - The CY 2018-2022 5 year average fatal accident rate was 0.79 per 100K hours through April 2022. Lee Roskop Fleet Safety Section, AIR-723 Operational Safety Branch, Compliance & Airworthiness Division 817-222-5337 lee.roskop@faa.gov