Yep, that's it. One of the most common causes of RC aircraft crashes known and I have been bit in the butt before by this DUMB mistake!!! I have learned over the years to always check the RX battery voltage before each flight and March 6th was no different except I was having too much fun and rushed to get that "last flight of the day" in before it got too dark out. You guessed it, forgot to check the RX voltage. The result... the fuselage is a compete write off but the mechanics will live to see another day. About $700.00 CND in repair damage and perhaps 30 to 40 hours of time required (if I decide to rebuild it). All because I omitted a 20 second easy voltage check.

The bird was about 7 minutes into it's 5 flight of the day. I was in a hard banking turn about 60 feet up when things got ugly. I first detected the controls were getting slow and intermittent but it all happened too fast. The damage could have been worse, but upon brown-out, somehow the fail-safe settings must have kicked in and leveled the swash while killing the engine power so the heli came down relatively "flat". I also was over a very soft muddy grass field that absorbed much of the energy upon impact.