Dash 8-400
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe
Flight Crew Landed in Emergency Condition; Flight Crew Returned To Departure Airport
Aircraft
[During takeoff] I called V1 Rotate & the aircraft violently shook. 1st thinking we had blown 1 or 2 of our nose tires & told ATC we would need to do a fly by to try to assess extent of the damage to the nose gear &/or tires.  Being confident that it was a tire that blew (& that was confirmed soon later when ATC said that tire fragments were found on the runway) we never brought the gear up.  I contacted the FA's [Flight Attendants]; told them of the situation & told them we would be returning to [departure airport] & that we'd doing a flyby & that they had about 15 min. to prepare. I informed ops & then I talked to dispatch & then ran the QRH for landing.  We prepared for our flyby & I contacted the FA's & asked them to check the main landing gears just in case my assumption was wrong.  My A FA informed me that the left inboard tire was blown & the outboard seemed still intact.  We proceeded for our flyby & all that ATC was able to tell us was that all three gears were down.  We went around & advised ATC we still needed to burn off another 500lbs of fuel before we would be able to land.  I contacted dispatch again and agreed that there was no need to evacuate unless there was a chance of fire. I talked to the FA's again & told them we would brace for landing.  We completed all checklists; we discussed how we would land the ac [aircraft] & what would happen when we landed.  We came in and my FO [First Officer] touched down the ac on the right side first & then let the left gear come down & made a great landing.  I took controls & came to a full stop & completed the shutdown of the aircraft.I think the main reason for the failure of the tire is that it was a retread tire. I was told that this was the third tire to fail in the last few months. I am not sure that the cost savings are worth the overall safety of the employees as well as the customers.
The approach and landing went according to plan and the aircraft was stopped and secured on the runway. We were met by firetrucks and airport personnel who assisted in securing the aircraft. Passengers and crew were kept on board until airport services provided buses to take all involved back over to the airport.
Dash 8-400 flight crew reported they experienced a main gear tire failure on takeoff.