The student pilot was on his first solo cross-country flight in a Cessna 150 near Matlock, Wash., when the weather started to deteriorate. He descended to a lower altitude to avoid clouds and proceeded toward the nearest airport. When he tried to level off at the lower altitude, the airplane continued to descend at a rate […]
NTSB Accidents
Video: Cirrus ditches under chute in Pacific Ocean
According to DCNewsroom, on Sunday, January 25, 2015, “The Coast Guard launched crews aboard an HC-130 Hercules airplane and an MH-65 Dolphin helicopter from Air Station Barbers Point,” to intercept a Cirrus SR-22 enroute from California to Hawaii that would be ditching – fuel starvation – in the Pacific Ocean “230 miles north east of […]
Accidental trim activation leads to accident
The private pilot and a CFI were on an instructional flight in a Cessna 172 near Peoria, Illinois. The airplane was equipped with an electric trim activation switch on the yoke. According to the private pilot, during the takeoff shortly after rotation, the nose pitched downward and the plane bounced on the runway. The CFI took […]
CFI misjudges fuel onboard
A CFI and private pilot were attempting to do a two-leg cross-country flight in a Cirrus SR20. Before takeoff from Danbury, Conn., the CFI used a flashlight to look in the fuel tanks and determined they contained 25 gallons of usable fuel, and that the flight would require 23.3 gallons of fuel. He then entered 22 gallons […]
Girlfriend walks into propeller
The pilot reported that he and a passenger were preparing to take off in a Quicksilver Sport from an airport in Camarillo, Calif. The airplane has a rear-mounted engine and the engine was running when the passenger’s girlfriend approached the airplane from behind to check an airframe-mounted camera she had installed to document the flight. Several […]
Airplane caught in power lines
A witness on the ground in Boulder, Utah, said the Cessna 140 was flying at a low altitude over an area that had power lines about 100 feet above ground level. The plane hit the lines and crashed, killing the pilot and passenger. The post-accident examination did not find any mechanical issues with the airplane. Local residents reported seeing […]
Hard landing leads to gear failure
During an instructional flight in a Cessna 172RG over Redmond, Ore., the CFI and student were unable to fully extend or retract the left main landing gear. They made several attempts to fix the problem, but were unsuccessful, so they made a gear-up landing. The post-accident examination revealed that the pivot assembly for the left main landing […]
Sebring crash victims identified
Sheriff’s deputies have identified the two people who died in the crash of an Aero Adventure amphibious LSA near the main runway at Sebring Regional Airport in Florida, site of the U.S. Sport Aviation Expo. According to a report at AVweb, pilot Dennis Day, of Groveland, Florida, and Jason Spinks, 44, of Orlando, were killed […]
Piper gets away during hand-propping
The pilot was attempting to hand-prop a Piper Comanche by himself in Phillipsburgh, Ohio. He did not set the parking brake before he began the procedure. When the engine started, the airplane began to move forward. The pilot tried to reach into the cockpit to grab the hand brake, but in the process pushed the throttle in, which made […]