ATL04CA170 · Cessna 172R
PDK Flight Academy Cessna 172R · Accident: loss of control in flight during an uncontrolled descent
From DeKalb Peachtree Airport (PDK) to DeKalb Peachtree Airport (PDK)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL04CA170
- 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 172R
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N26486
- Operator
- PDK Flight Academy
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From DeKalb Peachtree Airport (PDK), Atlanta, GATo DeKalb Peachtree Airport (PDK), Peachtree City, 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 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
- Uncontrolled 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
- 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
- Dual student › Control interference, intentional
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the certified flight instructor (CFI), during takeoff climb at approximately 75 feet the dual student told the CFI to "take the airplane; we've got to go down now". The CFI replied "ok my airplane". The CFI attempted to add full power to conduct a go-around. The dual students hand remained on the throttle. The CFI told the dual student that he had to conduct a go-around, the dual student responded "no we have to get down now". The CFI instructed the dual student to "let go of the throttle; my airplane; we need full power". The CFI attempted to add full power but the dual student continued to pull the power back to idle. The CFI yelled at the dual student "you're going to kill us; let go!" The CFI applied full elevator back pressure and the airplane collided with the airport fence. No flight control or mechanical anomalies were reported by the CFI or the dual student.
Probable cause
The intentional interuption of the flight controls in flight that resulted in a uncontrolled descent and collision with a fence.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL04CA170
- Event ID
- 20041004X01559
- Case number
- ATL04CA170
- 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: cce6f8c071f82e53c4e670199a642c6ea0525c6a851bb825eada39b7b2135ebd; retrieved 2026-09-21T19:09:24.096Z.