Fatal - MTOSport 5Y-KWV, Kenya 19 NOV 2020

Yes that as valid a source as possible for UK but your initial headline number is quite skewed I think. 3200 AutoGyro and yet only 217 factory built in the UK, maybe we get to 1000 for the total of EU countries. The USA has relatively few "factory built" turn key aircraft and I'd suggest that the majority of the rest are in China then I shudder to think what the loss rate is there.

Flight hours wise for the UK, using CAP780 - which references the same data you suggest - https://publicapps.caa.co.uk/docs/33/CAP780.pdf page 25. Suggests roughly 10hours per machine as a quick and dirty number. So 87hrs per machine today as an average I think there must be a flaw in that data somewhere. For example G-RARA is the instructor aircraft for Kai Maurer, who was/is one of the busiest instructors in south England. In 7 years it has 1800 hours or circa 250hrs per year - there is no way the average guy is flying anywhere near close to that and 2020 is a total bust given the virus. Sorry I'm kind of calling out the numbers but I'd be interested to see the spreadsheet etc on that calculation.
 
Phil, your source is 12 years old, based on data up to a decade older than that !

And we are not talking about the "average guy", but the average machine. The median machine is doing about 50 hours, so 50% do less than that.

The average figure of 83 hours is used to better calculate the total hours flown by the fleet, which is then used to calculate the fatals/million rate.

We know a lot of those hours will be flown by instructors, but I have not found a way to separate them out from the total.

I accept that 2020 is an oddity, and will have to find some way to fix that.

The most modern gyros are found in:-

Germany
France
USA
South Africa
UK
Italy
Spain
Australia

who collectively comprise about 70% of the total.

then smaller numbers in 58 other countries.

China has about 50.

I think there are getting on for 3000 in EU/Western Europe.
 
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Yes the data I've presented is as per the source but its the rational for the question. In 2007 the entire gyroplane hours flown was circa 2188hrs by 278 aircraft, now you are suggesting that there are at least 217 factory built x 83hrs = 18011hrs are flown.... Really, a 9x uplift?

Maybe 20 instructors do 200hrs average a year because some are part time / not that busy etc - again for colour G-CITX was a very busy aircraft for Jim Hughes when he was instructing at Rufforth and then himself. That aircraft as no more than 800hrs in 5 years.

There are maybe 20 aircraft parked at Rufforth - most don't move from one year to the next, same at my airfield - I think of the 4 based there 1 has done 25 hours in 12 months the others gather dust, and so it continues. So I just would like to see the model / spreadsheet that gets to 18000hrs because I don't believe it.
 
Another snippet from the NTSB stats which is very telling.

The ratio of total accidents to fatals in GA/Private Flying in the US is a very stable 5:1

I count 52 reports on modern gyros in the UK AAIB database. That's a ratio of 13:1 for the UK.

I think the standards of reporting and overall safety are very similar for the UK and US.

For gyros, 2.6 times the ratio...
 
@Philbennett your information on machines gathering dust "hanger queens" certainly rings true for all types of machines here in France. I try and hit 100 hours per year because machines are too expensive to be "hanger queens" (2020 has blown that to pieces for me)

On another link I asked of the Australian gyro guys what is the accident rate amongst their guys working as musterers (for got proper name) which is after all mainly low level high octane flying.

His response was that data is not available as mustering with gyros is illegal, but, he said most of the gyro accidents are "weekend" pilots.

And that, maybe where the problem lies, qualified pilots with long periods not flying.

phil (de fer)
 
PhilB, data always beats anecdotes !

Go to G-INFO

In Advanced Search, type in Rotorsport or Magni, under Aircraft Type. This will bring up a list of all those UK aircraft.

For each record, note the Total Hours, and the year that data was recorded.

Divide the total by the number of years elapsed since Year Built. That is (approx) the average per year for that machine. Note that number.

Repeat for the next record.

Then average those numbers.

You don't necessarily have to do them all. A sample of 20-30 will be enough.

Try it in a spreadsheet, with the average and median calculated as you are going along.

I did it very precisely in late 2017 for all aircraft then on the register.

I'll be interested in the figures you find three years later.
 
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Yes interesting - its a bit of a risk doing a small sample size don't you think? Let me do 30 and make a list and see how we get on.

But I suppose a fair methodology sample size aside.
 
Since I'm a nerdy git, I've done em all, manually. It actually didn't take anywhere as long as writing scripts to screenscrape the data back in 2017!

Average: 69.0
Median: 56.4

So the average is down about 17% from what I calculated 3 years ago.

which is what we would expect for a 2020 essentially "dead year" being added to a fleet of average age of about 6-7 years...Average annual hours, UK modern gyros.png
We see that the mode (most common value) is in the 20-30 hours range, although the average is much higher at 69.

Anecdotes: we meet a lot of people doing few hours.
Data: but remember, there are a few doing a LOT of hours !
 
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Interesting. I've just looked at Cav and MT-03 I'll send you the data in a PM. But I get a number of 59hrs av. for Cavalon and 39hrs for MT-03 [ex-instructor machines which I know]. The more interesting numbers are total hours flown - ex instructor as far as I can tell. That is 11585hrs in MT-03, 6913hrs in Cavalon. That makes 18.5K hours. So the fatal accident rate is roughly 144/mio in Cavalon, 86/mio in MT-03. Yet outside of fatals the rate is even worse, being an accident rate of 867/mio in Cavalon, 863/mio in MT-03 - which is an interesting correlation...
 
can't send you data as too many characters in a PM... basically the Cavalon data ex'd out the rotorsport demo and an instructor machine used in Exeter. Same for the MT-03 just ex'd out the instructor aircraft.
 
I've not gone into the instructor/non-instructor breakdowns, Phil. Too complex, although my interest is now piqued. [I'll give it some thought!]

However, the NTSB data shows that "Training" is the safest mode of flying, with a fatal rate of about one-fifth that of "Personal Flying"...

5.5 vs 26.4 per million hours.
 
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Well there is dual training and solo training. The last two fatals have been solo training? My student with a medical and the latest one with, we will see. If its medical then there is a clue about how to improve things! But on the data if you look at Cavalon then G-CGYX was the original certification and demo aircraft and G-CHWM, which I've flown actually, is an instructional aircraft used by Nick Wright. In MT-03 world then if you look at the registration history I ex-d out CDZZ,CEHM,CEHN,CERF,CEVY,CEYR, CFAK,CFBJ, CFCL, CFCW,CFGG, CFGY, DADA, KEVG, PILZ, RYDR as all are instructor aircraft at some point. Probably more but rented off private individuals, still its a start.

But it seems you get roughly an accident per 1000hrs of flying in a gyroplanes and in fairness is about right. I know the fleet hours for Cavalon is 6913 and I know GERN, CITV, CKYV, CKYT, CGYV, EVAA and CIEW have been pranged.
 
Interesting that the UK does not seem to use numerals in its registry...
 
Another perspective, on the Big-3...

My best guess on the proportion of hulls involved in fatals, by model. Overall it's 1.5%

Cavalon1.2%
Calidus0.5%
MTOSport1.0%
MT-031.2%
M240.9%
M223.3%
M161.2%
M182.4%
M141.9%
ELA-100.4%
ELA-097.7%
ELA-082.1%
ELA-075.8%
 
Interesting that the UK does not seem to use numerals in its registry...
Yep, we just like to put our names or initials on instead.... (^_-)

or "jokes"

We're funny like that....
 
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In addition to percentages, can we see those numbers as fractions?
Here we are only allowed as many as two letters, in the last two positions. It's hard to get too funny that way.
 
Sorry for the thread drift on the 5Y accident but the way I look at fatals is that the gyroplane community has been very lucky in some ways because given the relative lack of protection afforded both by the aircraft and personal equipment there have been a great many pranged aircraft without consequence plus of course in any other class the circumstances would have had deeper analysis.

For example when you look at the AAIB report for CKYV and the picture of the damaged hull you can easily see how rolling down a runway at +30/40/50mph and a bang on the head kills. https://assets.publishing.service.g...c6f437/Rotorsport_UK_Cavalon_G-CKYV_01-19.pdf

Same for these Calidus accidents where the pilot is unable to egress because of the canopy mechanics and the lack of thought to using the hammer. Indeed the AAIB have commented upon that fact.

Then you read this accident background, trainee, training flight, previously in the US as a 7 man detail to do 1 month of training.... As I said before it would be interesting to know the background and on going training along with oversight to the way sorties are planned and executed but those pictures look like 5Y went in with no forward speed.

What is interesting is that if you look at the way the AAIB investigate other classes then all manner of detail is looked at. Take the S92 G-LAWX. There will be no "oh how on earth did that happen" when the final report comes out there, and it didn't even actually crash!
 
ModelHullsFatals%
Cavalon50961.2%
Calidus58630.5%
MTOSport116611.51.0%
MT-0385310.51.2%
M2433030.9%
M2221573.3%
M166457.51.2%
M184212.4%
M145311.9%
ELA-101320.50.4%
ELA-091317.7%
ELA-084812.1%
ELA-07430255.8%

the 0.5s are for a mid-air between 2 gyros in France, and for a MT-03 that was stated as being "converted" into an MTOSport in Germany.
 
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I don't know where the 509 Cavalons are sat but in the UK we have 32 and 1 fatal - look at it that way and on a % basis we are over 3x your number. MT-03 in the UK is higher. So do we conclude the UK is a dangerous place to fly?
 
I don't really understand the rationale for ½ a figure for a collision with another gyro. It seems to me that's 1 each, even if they happened simultaneously and in the same incident.
 
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