DEN83LA173 · Mooney M20J
Mooney M20J · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to K80 · Oberlin, KS
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN83LA173
- 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
Mooney M20J
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N43CA
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo K80 · Oberlin, KS
- 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 terrain/water
- 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 › Lack of total experience in type operation
- Pilot in command › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Procedures/directives, improper use of
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ARPT HAD ONE ASPHALT RWY THAT WAS CLOSED & ANOTHER DIRT RWY THAT WAS MUDDY. THEREFORE, THE PLT ELECTED TO TAKEOFF ON THE PARKING RAMP WHICH WAS ORIENTED IN A NORTH/SOUTH DIRECTION & WAS 1700 FT LONG. THE PLT DID NOT CONSULT THE TAKEOFF CHARTS IN HIS OPERATING HANDBOOK. HE CONCLUDED THAT THERE WAS SUFFICIENT ROOM TO TAKEOFF SINCE THE ACFT NORMALLY USED ONLY 1500 FT AT HIS HOME ARPT IN OBERLIN, KS. HOWEVER, FOR TAKEOFF AT AURORA, CO, THE DENSITY ALT WAS APRX 7300 FT. ALSO, THE PLT USED SOFT FIELD PROCEDURES FOR TAKEOFF. SPECIFICALLY, BACK PRESSURE WAS USEDON THE CONTROL WHEEL FOR ALL OF THE TAKEOFF ROLL, THE NOSEWHEEL WAS LIFTED OFF EARLY & THE PLT TOOK OFF AT 60 KTS, THEN LOWERED THE NOSE TO STAY IN GROUND EFFECT. BEYOND THE END OF THE RAMP, THE ACFT HIT UNEVEN, RISING TERRAIN IN A WHEAT FIELD. FOR A SHORT FIELD TAKEOFF ON HARD SURFACE, NOSE-UP ELEVATOR INPUT IN NOT NORMALLY USED UNTIL ROTATION SPEED.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN83LA173
- Event ID
- 20001214X43717
- Case number
- DEN83LA173
- 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: 73071fb80e8d9d6b9963a4f754f5d26f07a38b626f9c1a60d073ad21285b6346; retrieved 2026-09-23T21:43:04.092Z.