LAX95LA323 · Cessna 172N
El Toro Marine Aero Club Cessna 172N · Accident: loss of control on ground/water during takeoff
From NZJ · MCAS EL TORO, CA to L35
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX95LA323
- 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 172N
- 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
- N739NN
- Operator
- El Toro Marine Aero Club
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From NZJ · MCAS EL TORO, CATo L35
- 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
- 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 › Directional control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Ground loop/swerve, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE OPERATOR STATED THAT NO MECHANICAL MALFUNCTIONS OR FAILURES WERE IDENTIFIED OR CLAIMED BY THE PILOT. THE PILOT ATTEMPTED A TOUCH AND GO AT THE MOUNTAIN RESORT AIRPORT AND TOUCHED DOWN IN THE FIRST THIRD OF THE RUNWAY. HE APPLIED FULL POWER, RETRACTED THE FLAPS, AND SET THE MIXTURE CONTROL TO FULL RICH. DURING THE GROUND ROLL, THE PILOT DECIDED THAT INSUFFICIENT RUNWAY REMAINED TO COMPLETE THE TAKEOFF AND HE ABORTED. THE AIRCRAFT VEERED OFF THE RUNWAY AND COLLIDED WITH A DRAINAGE DITCH. THE BIG BEAR AIRPORT IS AT 6,748 FEET MEAN SEA LEVEL, AND THE RUNWAY IS 5,850 FEET LONG. THE DENSITY WAS ESTIMATED AT 8,900 FEET. THE PILOT IS A MILITARY AVIATOR ASSIGNED TO FLY LARGE TURBINE POWERED HELICOPTERS. HE HAS LIMITED EXPERIENCE WITH SMALL PISTON ENGINE AIRPLANES.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to maintain directional control during an aborted takeoff attempt, which was necessitated by his failure to properly lean the fuel mixture. The pilot's limited experience in small piston engine airplanes was a factor in the accident.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX95LA323
- Event ID
- 20001207X03763
- Case number
- LAX95LA323
- 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: 3f912d63aa376b650b8f0c9bfb6bc0c499f2b1451435374bab5763c34d57876a; retrieved 2026-09-22T23:50:43.926Z.