FLIGHT FINDINGSAVIATION OCCURRENCE MAP
Back to map

DEN83LA110 · Cessna 172F

8 May 1983 · Escalante, UT, United States

Cessna 172F · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb

From an unrecorded airport to Santa Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)

Report a problem

Event

NTSB case
DEN83LA110
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 172F

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
N5501R
Operator
Brant C. Calkin · private individual
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From not recordedTo Santa Fe Municipal Airport (SAF), Santa Fe, NM
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 in command › Abort, delayed
  • Pilot in command › Performance data, disregarded
  • Pilot in command › Proper alignment, not maintained
  • Pilot in command › Proper climb rate, not attained

Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

THE ACFT COLLIDED WITH THE TERRAIN AND NOSED OVER OFF THE DEPARTURE END OF THE RUNWAY DURING TAKEOFF. THE RUNWAY IN USE WAS 12 AND THE WIND WAS FROM 180 DEGREES AT 5 KTS GUSTING TO 15 KTS. THE RUNWAY IS 5000 FEET LONG AND 60 FEET WIDE. THE FIELD ELEVATION IS 5740 FEET AND THE TEMPERATURE WAS 70 DEGREES F. THE DENSITY ALT. WAS ABOUT 7500 FEET. THE ACFT WING TANKS WERE FULL AND THERE WERE 4 PERSONS ON BOARD. THE PILOT STATED THAT THE ACFT SKIPPED TO THE LEFT JUST PRIOR TO TAKEOFF AND THEN WOULD NOT CLIMB OVER 50 FEET. HE COULD NOT GET THE ACFT BACK OVER THE RUNWAY. THE STALL WARNING SOUNDEDSO HE PUT THE WHEEL FORWARD AND THE PLANE TOUCHED THE END OF THE RUNWAY, SKIPPED OVER A GULLY AND HIT ON THE WHEELS ON THE SIDE OF A HILL ABOUT 200 OFF THE END OF THE RUNWAY. THE NOSE GEAR DUG INTO THE SOFT DIRT AND THE ACFT NOSED OVER. NOONE WAS INJURED.

Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record DEN83LA110
Event ID
20001214X42952
Case number
DEN83LA110
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: ea009653c3e7e30bca805b5a1c0991bb354f9159d2a9356fe00e62fdc1ca4807; retrieved 2026-09-23T22:17:37.537Z.