FAA Rotorcraft Monthly Accident Briefing - February

Lee Roskop
Feb 11
3 min read

Updated: 5 hours ago

Attached is the

(fifth month of FY25).

(Covers Part 27, Part 29, and Restricted Category rotorcraft accidents to U.S. registered aircraft. Does not include gyrocopters or experimental aircraft.)

Please access the information from this briefing directly anytime at the FAA’s publicly available, Rotorcraft Accident Dashboard.

Find “Dashboard Navigation” near the top of the default page and click either “Historical Briefing” or “Make Model Breakdown” for access to all 3 pages of visualized and interactive data.

Monthly Summary

February Totals: 8 accidents, 2 fatal accident, 3 fatalities

- The Personal/Private industry sector accounted for 5 of the 8 accidents that occurred during the month.

- Both of the fatal accidents during the month were also in the Personal/Private industry sector.

FY25 Summary

FY25 Totals: 31 accidents, 8 fatal accidents, 18 fatalities

Accidents (includes both fatal & non-fatal accidents):

- The FY25 estimated accident rate for Oct-Feb was 2.79 per 100K hours (18% lower than the same period in FY24 and 19% lower than the 5 year average for the same period).

- 7 of the 31 accidents (23%) for Oct-Feb occurred in TX, more than twice as many as the next closest state.

- The 5 accidents in the Personal/Private industry sector in February elevated Personal/Private to accounting for 29% of all accidents so far in the FY, more than double the percentage of the next closest industry sector.

- Personal/Private historically accounts for about 4% of the U.S. rotorcraft hours flown each year.

Fatal Accidents:

- The FY25 estimated fatal accident rate for Oct-Feb was 0.72 per 100K hours (12% higher than the same period in FY24 and 9% higher than the 5 year average for the same period).

- The rate includes 2 fatal accidents that were U.S. registered but occurred outside the U.S. that occurred earlier in the FY.

- Personal/Private was the only industry sector with more than 1 fatal accident for Oct-Feb and accounted for 50% of the fatal accidents through the first 5 months of the FY.

Fatalities:

- The FY25 estimated fatality rate for Oct-Feb was 1.62 per 100K hours (11% higher than the same period in FY24, 9% higher than the 5 year average for the same period).

- The rate includes 4 fatalities from earlier in the FY that occurred on rotorcraft that were U.S. registered but occurred outside the U.S.

- 26% of the rotorcraft accidents so far in FY25 have had a fatality. The long-term historical average for both the most recent 10 years and the 42 years on record is 17%.

U.S. Helicopter Safety Team (USHST) Calendar Year Metrics

The USHST’s 5 year goals for 2025-2029 are based on individual 14 CFR Operating Parts, tracked by the 5 year average fatal accident rates per 100K hours.

14 CFR Part	Baseline, CY2018-2022 (per 100K hours)	Goal, CY2025-2029 (per 100K hours)	Progress, CY2021-2025 (per 100K hours)
91	0.81	0.73 (10% reduction)	0.6
133	1.73	1.56 (10% reduction)	0.42
135	0.33	0.17 (50% reduction)	0.34
137	1.11	1.00 (10% reduction)	1.46