IAD97LA094 · Piper PA-28-161
Piper PA-28-161 · Accident during takeoff
From Block Island State Airport (BID) to Igor I Sikorsky Memorial Airport (BDR)
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD97LA094
- 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
Piper PA-28-161
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N80964
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Block Island State Airport (BID)To Igor I Sikorsky Memorial Airport (BDR), Bridgeport, CT
- 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
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aborted takeoff, delayed
- Pilot in command › Checklist, not followed
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Block Island, RI, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that all preflight and pre-takeoff checklist items were completed. After the airplane accelerated to 65 knots on the takeoff roll, the pilot 'pulled back on the yoke and the plane wouldn't takeoff.' The pilot aborted the takeoff by 'pulling the throttle to the closed position and simultaneously applying the brakes.' The airplane rolled off the departure end of the runway, down an embankment, struck a chain link fence where it came to rest in an upright position. Faint traces of rubber were found on the runway which corresponded to the wheel marks in the grass which lead to the airplane. The grass did not show indications of tearing or furrowing consistent with heavy braking or skidding tires. No malfunction anomalies were found in the airframe or the engine. The elevator trim was found in a 3/4 nose down position.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to comply with the airplane's takeoff checklist and his delayed decision to abort the takeoff.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD97LA094
- Event ID
- 20001208X08157
- Case number
- IAD97LA094
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1997-06-29.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 1b5b0ddc7bc5816ae79c6c4d38638fa9fb616a0a39cac3cd35080b1845e82fe0; retrieved 2026-09-21T21:24:03.818Z.