NYC95LA061 · Cessna 172M
Cessna 172M · Accident: loss of control on ground/water during takeoff
From Buffalo Airfield (9G0) to Buffalo Airfield (9G0)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC95LA061
- 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 172M
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N13229
- Operator
- Buffalo Airfield MGMT. Copr
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Buffalo Airfield (9G0)To Buffalo Airfield (9G0), NY
- 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 · roll/run
- 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
- Loss of control on ground/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 › Planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT STATED THAT HE USED RUNWAY 24, A 66-FOOT-WIDE RUNWAY FOR TAKEOFF. THE RUNWAY WAS ICE COVERED AND BRAKING ACTION WAS POOR, SO HE PERFORMED SOFT FIELD TAKEOFF TECHNIQUES, TO MINIMIZE THE TIME ON THE RUNWAY. DURING THE TAKEOFF ROLL, THE AIRPLANE VEERED TO THE LEFT, AND THE PILOT CORRECTED TO THE RIGHT WITH FULL RIGHT RUDDER AND FULL RIGHT AILERON. THE LEFT MAIN GEAR STRUCK A SNOW BANK AND THE AIRPLANE TURNED TO THE LEFT AND NOSED OVER. THE FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION INSPECTOR'S STATEMENT OF AN INTERVIEW WITH THE PILOT STATED, '[THE PILOT] DID NOT ATTEMPT TO ABORT THE TAKEOFF BECAUSE HE THOUGHT HE COULD LIFT OFF PRIOR TO [VEERING OFF] THE SIDE OF THE RUNWAY.' AT GREATER BUFFALO INTERNATIONAL, 4 MILES SOUTH, THE WINDS WERE REPORTED FROM 280 DEGREES AT 20 KNOTS GUSTING TO 25 KNOTS.
Probable cause
The pilot's improper planning/decision to attempt a takeoff on a narrow icy runway with crosswind conditions, which resulted in the loss of control of the airplane, impact with a snow bank, and a nose over.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC95LA061
- Event ID
- 20001207X03031
- Case number
- NYC95LA061
- 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: 6838eb5301f5a7f2b02b3b6bbea5a14c2e92afa59d524618855905e57de045a5; retrieved 2026-09-23T00:12:56.463Z.