LAX85LA184 · Cessna 152
Air Center International Cessna 152 · Accident: undershoot on approach
From an unrecorded airport to Shafter Airport - Minter Field (MIT)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX85LA184
- 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 152
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 152
- 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
- N67001
- Operator
- Air Center International
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Shafter Airport - Minter Field (MIT)
- 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
- Approach
- 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
- Undershoot
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Wire, transmission
- 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 › Planned approach, improper
- Pilot in command › Proper altitude, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Remedial action, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE STUDENT PLT WAS ON HIS 1ST SUPERVISED SOLO FLT. HE REPORTED THAT ON DOWNWIND, THE ACFT WAS TOO HI, SO HE EXTENDED 10 DEG OF FLAPS. ON BASE, HE EXTENDED THE FLAPS TO 20 DEG, & BEFORE TURNING ONTO FINAL APCH, HE FURTHER EXTENDED THEM TO 30 DEG. THE STUDENT THEN REALIZED THE ACFT WAS GETTING TOO LOW, SO HE RETRACTED THE FLAPS. THE ACFT THEN DESCENDED EXTREMELY LOW, COLLIDED WITH POWER LINES APRX 1/2 MI FROM THE RWY & CRASH LANDED IN AN OPEN FIELD. THE CHIEF INSTRUCTOR BELIEVED THE STUDENT'S CFI USED IMPROPER METHODS & RELEASED THE STUDENT FOR SOLO BEFORE HE WAS READY. TWO OTHER EXPERIENCED INSTRUCTORS PROVIDED AN ADDITIONAL 40 HRS OF DUAL INSTRUCTION & DID NOT RE-SOLO THE STUDENT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX85LA184
- Event ID
- 20001214X35966
- Case number
- LAX85LA184
- 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: 29fc3758968c5f6b0b2b7a802975666169d8027014c826b2300080ec1bb6e71e; retrieved 2026-09-22T01:55:36.243Z.