DEN04LA046 · Piper PA-28-151
Piper PA-28-151 · Accident: loss of control in flight during landing
From Skypark Airport (BTF) to Skypark Airport (BTF)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN04LA046
- 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
Piper PA-28-151
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N33363
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Skypark Airport (BTF), Bountiful, UTTo Skypark Airport (BTF), Bountiful, UT
- 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
- Landing · flare/touchdown
- 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 › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Visual lookout, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the student pilot, the local flight was to practice ground reference and performance maneuvers in preparation for his private pilot check ride. When he returned to the airport, he decided not to do any pattern work and he set up for a full stop landing on runway 16. He stated that, because of the winds, he came in with no flaps. While on final approach he realized he was a little high, so he decreased the engine power to idle and descended to the runway. The pilot stated that "when the airplane touched down, the right main [landing gear] wheel touched down well into the snow." When the airplane veered and departed the right side of the runway, the left wing impacted a snow bank. The airplane came to a stop on a heading of approximately 220 degrees. The impact with the snow bank crushed the leading edge of the left wing and bent the left wing's spar. According to the student pilot, he examined the touchdown point of both main wheels and stated that, "they were both within the runway boundary." He also stated that, "the runway wasn't plowed [to its] full width," and there were no Notices To Airman (NOTAMS) that identified this. According to an FAA inspector, the student pilot had not flown with an instructor for over 30 days and the student pilot's 90-day solo endorsement had expired.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to maintain aircraft control and adequate visual outlook during the landing flare. Contributing factors include the pilot's lack of recent experience, the snow bank, and the snow-covered runway.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN04LA046
- Event ID
- 20040223X00219
- Case number
- DEN04LA046
- 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: f6aff82e7c0cf2877bebc543fb2474d3b804d7ab87104f81045100e58261d108; retrieved 2026-09-22T08:00:06.141Z.