IAD97LA004 · Wsk Pzl Krosno KR-03A
Wsk Pzl Krosno KR-03A · Accident during initial climb
From N31 · PA to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD97LA004
- 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
Wsk Pzl Krosno KR-03A
- Aircraft type
- WSK PZL Krosno KR-03
- 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
- N288S
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From N31 · PATo 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Miscellaneous/other
- 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 and passenger of the glider were towed by a Cessna 182 from the right side of the 2,435 foot long grass runway. A winch cable was lying in the grass, parallel to the runway, extending from a glider winch truck. A witness saw the glider approximately 300 feet from the end of the runway with the winch cable hanging from the nose area of the glider. At an altitude of 40 to 50 feet above the ground, the glider pilot realized the glider had caught the winch cable, and released the tow line. The tow line and the winch cable dropped from the glider, and the glider pilot executed a turn to the left. The left wing of the glider came in contact with standing corn stalks, the glider rotated around the left wing tip and impacted the ground. The pilot reported that he discussed the presence of the cable with the airport manager, and the takeoff seemed normal except that it took a little longer to get airborne. The pilot did not report any mechanical malfunctions with the with glider.
Probable cause
the glider pilot's improper decision to takeoff despite the presence of a glider winch cable lying on the runway area, which led to the glider snagging the winch cable during the takeoff roll and a subsequent forced landing. A related factor was: the airport manager's improper decision to conduct aero-tow operations, while the glider winch cable was lying on the runway area.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD97LA004
- Event ID
- 20001208X06901
- Case number
- IAD97LA004
- 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: c20f9dd1ba467acbded0920696224c091101495f06d2dad8ef9223ff4b317fa5; retrieved 2026-09-21T12:25:01.891Z.