DEN93LA079 · Piper PA-11
Piper PA-11 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure while maneuvering
From Wichita Falls Municipal Airport / Sheppard Air Force Base (SPS) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN93LA079
- 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-11
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-11
- 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
- N4834M
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Wichita Falls Municipal Airport / Sheppard Air Force Base (SPS), Wichita Falls, TXTo 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
- Maneuvering
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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
- Flt control syst, elevator control cable/rod › Disconnected
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AFTER SIGHTSEEING FOR ABOUT 30 MINUTES, THE PILOT INITIATED A RIGHT BANK TO RETURN TO THE AIRPORT. THE AIRPLANE BEGAN DESCENDING AND FULL BACK PRESSURE WOULD NOT ARREST THE DESCENT. THE PILOT LEVELED THE WINGS AND APPLIED FULL POWER. THE AIRPLANE IMPACTED A RIVER SAND BAR. POST-ACCIDENT EXAMINATION DISCLOSED THE UP ELEVATOR CABLE WAS DISCONNECTED FROM THE CONTROL HORN. A BOLT, SEVERAL CASTLE NUTS, WASHERS, SHEET METAL SCREWS, A SPACER AND A REMNANT OF A COTTER PIN WERE VACUUMED FROM THE FLOOR OF THE AIRPLANE BENEATH THE ELEVATOR CONTROL HORN. THE AIRPLANE HAD ACCUMULATED 142 HOURS SINCE THE LAST ANNUAL INSPECTION 10 MONTHS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT.
Probable cause
THE DISCONNECTION OF THE UP ELEVATOR CABLE FROM THE CONTROL HORN. A FACTOR WAS THE INCORRECT INSTALLATION OF THE BOLT AND CASTLE NUT BY UNKNOWN MAINTENANCE PERSONNEL.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN93LA079
- Event ID
- 20001211X12892
- Case number
- DEN93LA079
- 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: 14711b47eb879529b6b9810b8340bdcd41294c113dc98d09ad9c7021541d03e8; retrieved 2026-09-21T22:52:27.273Z.