CHI08CA249 · Morane-Saulnier MS-760/B
Morane-Saulnier MS-760/B · Accident: loss of control on ground during takeoff
From Saint Paul Downtown Holman Field (STP) to Rice Lake Regional Airport - Carl's Field (RPD)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI08CA249
- 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
Morane-Saulnier MS-760/B
- Aircraft type
- Morane Saulnier MS-760
- 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
- N69X
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Saint Paul Downtown Holman Field (STP), St Paul, MNTo Rice Lake Regional Airport - Carl's Field (RPD), Rice Lake, WI
- 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 · rejected takeoff
- Defining eventThe 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 on ground
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
- Personnel issues › Task performance
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 he initiated the takeoff as normal. However, as the airplane accelerated through 80 knots the nose lifted "abruptly." He could not move the control stick far enough forward to lower the nose and level the airplane. As a result, he elected to reject the takeoff. The pilot used elevator trim, which lowered the nose enough for landing. The pilot reported the airplane touched down on the runway, but with the left wing low. The airplane drifted to the left and departed the runway pavement "at a shallow angle." The nose wheel steering had been disengaged during takeoff roll in accordance with standard flight manual procedures. As a result, the pilot was limited to differential braking to maintain control. The airplane encountered wet grass adjacent to the runway, and subsequently struck a runway sign and a light before coming to a stop. A post accident inspection revealed that the right front (co-pilot) seat belt had been buckled around the flight control stick, out of sight of the pilot, restricting full movement of the controls. The airplane sustained impact damage to the left wing, including the leading edge fuel tank and wing ribs. The pilot commented that he removed the co-pilot control stick to eliminate any possibility of a similar event in the future.
Probable cause
Restriction of the elevator controls due to the presence of the seat belt buckled around the co-pilot control stick. An additional cause was the failure of the pilot to verify that the flight controls were unobstructed before flight. Contributing factors were the wet grass encountered during the runway excursion, and the sign and light impacted during the event.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI08CA249
- Event ID
- 20080919X01503
- Case number
- CHI08CA249
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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: f20bd9f65196ac594b3630a5b71f4797ba8110c9df9cb9fab7da36c9d3dd7774; retrieved 2026-09-15T10:15:11.438Z.