IAD02LA068 · Cessna 150
Cessna 150 · Accident: in flight collision with object during takeoff
From Griswold, CT (no airport) to Spruce Airport (CT43)
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD02LA068
- 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
- Unknown
- 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 150
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 150
- 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
- N8894G
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Griswold, CT (no airport)To Spruce Airport (CT43), SPRUCE AIRPORT, CT
- 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
- Takeoff
- 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 object
- 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
- Tree(s)
- 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 › Preflight planning/preparation, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The non-certificated pilot made an emergency landing in an alfalfa field adjacent to a privately maintained airport. Instead of towing the airplane to the airport, the pilot elected to take-off from the 1,700-1,800 foot long field, which he described as "rolling and a little bumpy", with a tailwind. Additionally, there was a 25-foot high tree line located at the departure end of the field. During the take-off roll, the pilot had to keep the wings from contacting the ground, and said that he should have aborted the take-off after the airplane became momentarily airborne. The airplane climbed after it became airborne a second time. The airplane brushed the trees, and the pilot made a hard landing in another alfalfa field located on the other side of the tree line. Interpolation of the Cessna 150 Pilot Operating Handbook (POH) Take-off Performance Chart revealed that the airplane required 2,009 feet of takeoff distance to clear a 50 foot obstacle from a dry, grass runway with an 8-knot tailwind. The FAA suspended the pilot's certificates and ratings in 1999, and his most recent FAA medical certificate was issued on May 21, 1998. The pilot stated that there were no mechanical deficiencies with the airplane or engine. Witnesses reported the winds at the time of takeoff, consisted of a tailwind of 8 to 10 knots.
Probable cause
the pilot's improper pre-flight planning and decision to depart a field with insufficient runway. Factors were the rough/uneven terrain, high obstructions and the tailwind.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD02LA068
- Event ID
- 20020718X01156
- Case number
- IAD02LA068
- 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: b997adc24817b89764a290f1300d2f92faefcac0777788fe2309327e1e193fd2; retrieved 2026-09-22T10:45:45.860Z.