CHI03FA320 · Cessna 152
Cessna 152 · Accident: loss of control in flight during takeoff
From Three Oaks, MI to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI03FA320
- 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
- 1 · 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 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
- N25787
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Three Oaks, MITo 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
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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
- Stall/mush; 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was destroyed when it impacted trees and terrain after takeoff. A witness stated, "My brother, [the pilot], took off from the airstrip in the back of his property for a short flight to "buzz" us and fly over the house. ... The take-off appeared and sounded normal to my other brother and I standing at the house end of the airstrip watching him go. The plane banked to the right and approximately halfway into the turn the nose of the plane pointed straight down so that for 1/2 a second the entire plane was visible just above the far treeline with top (roof) of the plane and the wingspan facing us squarely. It fell straight down disappearing into the neighboring cornfield followed immediately by a small crash sound and then silence." Weather was: Wind 290 degrees at 9 knots, variable between 250 and 310 degrees; visibility 10 statute miles; sky condition few 3,800 feet; temperature 13 degrees C; dew point 4 degrees C; altimeter 30.07 inches of mercury. An on-scene investigation revealed both wing flaps were found retracted and the flap selector was at zero degrees. Fuel was found in the left wing fuel tank and in the carburetor. The right tank was found ruptured. Control continuity was established from the cockpit controls to each flight control surface and to the engine. The engine produced a thumb compression at each cylinder and both magnetos produced a spark at the end of each spark plug lead as the engine's crankshaft was rotated. The propeller exhibited chordwise scratches on the outboard section of one of its blades. The other blade was found with a forward bend. No anomalies were detected with the airplane and engine.
Probable cause
The pilot not maintaining adequate airspeed resulting in a stall during takeoff. Contributing factors were the buzzing flight and trees.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI03FA320
- Event ID
- 20030929X01614
- Case number
- CHI03FA320
- 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, coordinates. 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: 562a517f30a7ad38a2a12c0623b60f4143f23f271cb8eda74aa63bfb510c8ec0; retrieved 2026-09-20T18:56:41.549Z.