BFO89LA035 · Piper PA-25-235
Piper PA-25-235 · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO89LA035
- 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-25-235
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-25
- 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
- N9489P
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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 of other aircraft › Glider/tow release, delayed
- Pilot of other aircraft › Proper climb rate, not maintained
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Warrenton, VA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE PIPER WAS TOWING A GLIDER, A SCHWEIZER SGS 2-33. DURING CLIMB ABOUT 200 FT AGL WHEN, ACCORDING TO THE TOWPLANE PLT, HIS ACFT ABRUPTLY PITCHED DOWN. THE TOWPLANE DESCENDED AND THE PLT WAS UNABLE TO RECOVER IN TIME TO AVOID THE ACFT FROM STRIKING THE GROUND. ACCORDING TO THE GLIDER PLT, DURING THE TAKEOFF CLIMB HE ENCOUNTERED AN UPDRAFT WHICH CAUSED THE GLIDER TO ACCELERATE AND CLIMB DESPITE CORRECTIVE ACTION. THE GLIDER PLT STATED THAT WHEN HE RELEASED THE TOWROPE HE HEARD A POP SOUND AND THEN THE GLIDER PITCHED UP. THE GLIDER PILOT STATED THE AIRSPEED REACHED 105 MPH AND THE GLIDER PITCHED UP TO ABOUT 50 TO 60 DEGREES. THE GLIDER REACHED ABOUT 650 AGL BEFORE IT SLOWED TO 50 MPH AFTER WHICH HE RETURNED TO LAND. INVESTIGATION REVEALED THE GLIDER PILOT HAD 17 HRS TOTAL TIME IN GLIDERS; HOWEVER, UNTIL THE DAY OF THE ACCIDENT HE HAD NOT FLOWN GLIDERS FOR ABOUT 2 YRS. THIS WAS HIS THIRD FLIGHT OF THE DAY AND THE FIRST ONE WITHOUT AN INSTRUCTOR ABOARD.
Probable cause
THE FAILURE OF THE GLIDER PILOT TO MAINTAIN A PROPER CLIMB RATE DURING TAKEOFF AND THE DELAY IN RELEASING FROM THE TOWPLANE AFTER REALIZING THAT HE WAS CLIMBING WELL ABOVE THE TOWPLANE. CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT WAS THE UPDRAFT ENCOUNTERED AFTER TAKEOFF AND THE LACK OF RECENT EXPERIENCE OF THE GLIDER PILOT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO89LA035
- Event ID
- 20001213X28253
- Case number
- BFO89LA035
- 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: 4acaa8b46bb278b8b18ac7c55d7f64cd6b2f13673cb969c7a2fe101761e884e4; retrieved 2026-09-22T00:13:28.074Z.