IAD96LA142 · Schweizer SGS-1-26E
Harris Hill Soaring Schweizer SGS-1-26E · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From Harris Hill Gliderport (4NY8) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD96LA142
- 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
Schweizer SGS-1-26E
- Aircraft type
- Schweizer SGS-1
- 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
- N1142S
- Operator
- Harris Hill Soaring
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Harris Hill Gliderport (4NY8), NYTo 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
- 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 in flight
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Stall/spin
- 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 › Airspeed, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Altitude, misjudged
- Pilot in command › Stall/spin, inadvertent
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Elmira, NY, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that she had made two successful landings in the glider, and was on the third solo flight. According to the pilot, she was planning to land on runway 16, but decided at the last minute to change runways. She stated that the altitude and airspeed was inadequate to complete the landing on the new runway. She reported that she skidded the glider with the rudder to avoid banking too steeply and the combination initiated a stall and spin to the left. According to an FAA inspector, this was the pilot's third flight in this glider. The pilot reported that there was no mechanical malfunction, and the accident could have been prevented if she maintained a proper pattern airspeed, not change runways at the last minute, and not use a forward slip too low on final approach with the spoilers closed.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to maintain adequate altitude and airspeed during the landing approach, resulting in a stall/spin and subsequent encounter with an embankment.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD96LA142
- Event ID
- 20001208X06751
- Case number
- IAD96LA142
- 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: e1c688f25c7ea98d787e86c8773e6dd3d2f75b135f4e9146ebc38924d6221ccb; retrieved 2026-09-21T12:29:20.601Z.