MIA04CA090 · Caproni Vizzola Cos. Aero. A-21
Caproni Vizzola Cos. Aero. A-21 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water en route
From George M Bryan Airport (STF) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA04CA090
- 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
- Government
- 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
Caproni Vizzola Cos. Aero. A-21
- Aircraft type
- Caproni Vizzola Cos Aero A-21
- Category
- Glider
- 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
- N40171
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From George M Bryan Airport (STF), Starkville, MSTo 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
- Public Aircraft
- 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
- En route · descent
- 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 › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot stated that prior to the flight he was concerned with the possibility of a low cloud deck forming, but due to the four to five degree Fahrenheit temperature/dew point spread and a gentle wind he decided to go ahead with the flight, while monitoring the improving weather conditions. The weather conditions continued to improve during the tow up to 12,000 feet pressure altitude where the glider was released from the tow airplane. He stated that his tow airplane pilot remarked that there was a scattered layer forming to the east and north of the airport. The pilot continued the flight until he noticed the scattered layer was getting thicker and elected to return to the airport and land. When he realized the scattered layer was beginning to form over the airport, he began a maximum rate descent. As he approached the top of the scattered layer at 3,000 feet, the glider's canopy fogged completely over almost instantly. The pilot's only view outside the glider was through a two inch by two inch vent window. At 700 feet AGL he realized he was not going to make the airport so he elected to land in a field. The glider touched down wings level and rolled out about 40 feet before hitting several tree stumps.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate preflight planning and preparation and his delayed decision to return to the airport leading to an off airport landing as a result of deteriorating weather conditions. A finding in the investigation was the windshield that fogged up.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA04CA090
- Event ID
- 20040729X01097
- Case number
- MIA04CA090
- 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: 12e8f87f76f506302964cd89a84e84b26fc5984d6358bdf3f2c4508713f9a861; retrieved 2026-09-18T21:16:43.465Z.