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NYC94LA081 · Let SUPER BLANIK L-33 SUPER BLAN

15 May 1994 · New Castle, VA, United States

Let SUPER BLANIK L-33 SUPER BLAN · Accident: undershoot on approach

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Event

NTSB case
NYC94LA081
Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
Accident
InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
Completed
API-reported fatalities
0 · all aircraft and ground
Ground fatalities
0
OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
General aviation
WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
Visual Meteorological Cond

Let SUPER BLANIK L-33 SUPER BLAN

Category
Glider
RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
N23BR
Operator
Unknown
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From not recordedTo not recorded
Aircraft age
Not recorded
Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
Part 91: General Aviation
Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
Approach · VFR pattern final
First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
Undershoot
DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
Substantial

Cause areas

  • Pilot in command › Flight controls, improper use of
  • Pilot in command › Proper descent rate, not maintained

Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of New Castle, VA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.

NTSB narrative

THE PILOT HAD LESS THAN 1 HOUR OF PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE IN THIS MAKE AND MODEL GLIDER. DURING THE INITIAL CLIMB, BETWEEN 100 AND 200 FEET ABOVE THE GROUND (AGL), TURBULENCE WAS ENCOUNTERED BY THE TOW PLANE AND THE GLIDER. DURING THE DOWNWIND CLIMB, AT APPROXIMATELY 400 FEET AGL, AND 300 FEET FROM THE EDGE OF THE RUNWAY, THE GLIDER PILOT RELEASED THE TOW. BEFORE REACHING THE END OF THE RUNWAY THE PILOT INITIATED A TURN ONTO THE BASE LEG AND CONTINUED THE TURN TO FINAL. THE PILOT ESTIMATED HIS SINK RATE ON FINAL AT 2600 FEET PER MINUTE. THE GLIDER LANDED SHORT OF THE RUNWAY, HIT TRACTOR RUTS, AND SKEWED ABOUT 80 DEGREES TO THE LEFT AND STOPPED SHORT OF THE RUNWAY. WITNESSES REPORTED THAT THEY OBSERVED THE GLIDER SPOILERS DEPLOYED, FROM BASE LEG TO LANDING.

Probable cause

THE PILOT'S IMPROPER USE OF THE FLIGHT CONTROLS RESULTING IN FAILURE TO MAINTAIN A PROPER DESCENT RATE DURING THE APPROACH FOR LANDING. A FACTOR IN THIS ACCIDENT WAS THE PILOT'S LACK OF TOTAL EXPERIENCE IN THIS TYPE OF GLIDER.

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record NYC94LA081
Event ID
20001206X01370
Case number
NYC94LA081
Dataset
historical-pre2008
Source SHA-256
89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
  • Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
  • Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
  • The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
  • API snapshot SHA-256: c8a13275b573d71b7f59847f9f15e06ecbf036ddf761f222bf25a73e3f09f476; retrieved 2026-09-23T01:06:47.595Z.