Net Jets Cessna 560XL incident
Cessna 560XL · Incident: airframe, component or system failure during landing
From Chicago Executive Airport (PWK) to Savannah Hilton Head International Airport (SAV)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's departure or destination. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL04IA048
- 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
- Incident
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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 560XL
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 560
- 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
- N632QS
- Operator
- Net Jets
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route Narrative disagrees
- From Chicago Executive Airport (PWK), CHICAGO/PROSPEC, ILTo Savannah Hilton Head International Airport (SAV), Savannah, GA
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- Landing · emergency landing
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Minor
Cause areas
- Landing gear, nose gear › Malfunction
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the captain, yhe flight was uneventful until the flight was on final approach to land on runway 21 at the destination airport. After completing the landing checklist the captain observed the main landing gear position indicator lights were illuminated indicating that the main landing gear was down and locked. The nose gear position indicator light was illuminated indicating that the nose gear was unlocked, and the hydraulic system was still operating. The captain aborted the approach, and executed a go-around. During the go-around the hydraulic caution lights illuminated. The captain contacted the Beaufort approach to advise them of the situation. The captain then requested to fly by the Beaufort control tower to visually confirm the nose landing gear position. The control tower confirmed the main landing gear was extended and the nose gear was retracted. The captain declared an emergency, and was given radar vectors, and diverted to Savannah International Airport, where an emergency landing on runway 9 was performed. Post-examination of the airplane revealed, the nose wheel doors were scraped and the nose wheel tire was blown. The pilot did not report any flight control malfunctions. A total of eighteen laboratory physical tests, a kinematic study, several general inspections, and a conformity check were conducted in an effort to duplicate the condition that occurred on 560-5132. Seven tests were preformed on a nose gear assembly from a Cessna test article. Eleven tests were performed on the nose ear assembly from 560-5132, including leak tests and service procedure tests. During the laboratory environment test the field failure could not be duplicated.
Probable cause
The malfunction of the nose wheel gear for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL04IA048
- Event ID
- 20031217X02055
- Case number
- ATL04IA048
- 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: dfaf25c6e8a68c0c1ccb95700751924c57c2cc8e25baa12e299b022b0f6e6184; retrieved 2026-09-18T15:35:14.949Z.