IAD98LA087 · Cessna 172N
Cessna 172N · Accident: in flight collision with object during initial climb
From I77 · Blue Ash, OH to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD98LA087
- 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
- N733LK
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From I77 · Blue Ash, OHTo 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
- In flight collision with object
- 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(cfi) › Aborted landing, delayed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flight instructor was to demonstrate a sod field landing to the student pilot. The instructor set up for approach and landing to the west, with winds from the east at 7 knots. After touchdown, the instructor braked for a full stop but the airplane started to skid. The instructor then added power and configured the airplane for a go-around. He said he then attempted to abort the go-around because the flaps had not retracted, but the airplane again began to skid. During the skid, the flaps retracted and he again applied power for takeoff. The instructor stated that he lacked the runway to stop and could not gain sufficient airspeed to fly. At the end of the runway, in an effort to clear the highway at the departure end, the pilot 'popped' the airplane into the air. While over the highway, the landing struck the roof of a passing car. The airplane continued and landed in a field on the other side of the highway. Examination of the airplane revealed no discrepancies with the flaps or the flap actuating system.
Probable cause
The pilot's delay in aborting the landing, which resulted in inadequate obstacle (car) clearance during initial takeoff climb. A contributing factor is the pilot's decision to perform a tailwind landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD98LA087
- Event ID
- 20001211X10876
- Case number
- IAD98LA087
- 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: d7ce94585006a36069ec283d5e1a5baeba5b07487e31c584e095024bcc92faa4; retrieved 2026-09-22T17:16:24.408Z.