ANC94LA131 · Cessna 180B
Cessna 180B · Accident: on ground/water collision with terrain/water during takeoff
From an unrecorded airport to Fairbanks, AK
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC94LA131
- 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
Cessna 180B
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 180
- Category
- Airplane
- 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
- N5143E
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Fairbanks, AK
- 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
- Takeoff · rejected takeoff
- 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
- On ground/water collision with terrain/water
- 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 › Aborted takeoff, delayed
- Pilot in command › Lowering of flaps, improper use of
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT AND A PASSENGER WERE DEPARTING A REMOTE LAKE IN A FLOAT EQUIPPED AIRPLANE AS THE RETURN PORTION OF A CROSS-COUNTRY PERSONAL FLIGHT AT THE CONCLUSION OF A HUNTING TRIP. DURING THE TAKEOFF, THE PILOT REPORTED USING 10 DEGREES OF FLAPS THAT HE LOWERED TO 20 DEGREES WHEN THE AIRPLANE WOULD NOT BREAK FREE FROM THE WATER SURFACE. THE WATER CONDITIONS WERE SMOOTH AND GLASSY. WHEN THE AIRPLANE DID NOT ACCELERATE PROPERLY, THE PILOT ABORTED THE TAKEOFF; HOWEVER, THE AIRPLANE'S FORWARD MOMENTUM CARRIED THE AIRCRAFT INTO THE LAKE SHORELINE. THE FRONT PORTION OF THE FLOATS CONTACTED THE TERRAIN AND THE AIRPLANE NOSED OVER. THE AIRCRAFT OWNER'S MANUAL RECOMMENDS USING 20 DEGREES OF FLAPS THROUGHOUT THE TAKEOFF. ADDITIONALLY, UNDER HEAVY LOADS AND GLASSY WATER CONDITIONS, AN ABRUPT APPLICATION OF BACK CONTROL PRESSURE MAY BE NECESSARY TO BREAK FREE OF THE WATER SURFACE.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S IMPROPER USE OF THE FLAPS AND FLIGHT CONTROLS, AND A DELAY IN ABORTING THE TAKEOFF. A FACTOR IN THE ACCIDENT WAS GLASSY WATER CONDITIONS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC94LA131
- Event ID
- 20001206X02161
- Case number
- ANC94LA131
- 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: 4e95c70015d72d56ecdf4e075529072196f6578e7d38eca58e8b690873f2607c; retrieved 2026-09-23T00:43:12.262Z.