CHI08CA291 · Cessna 172 N
Skypark Cessna 172 N · Accident: runway excursion during landing
From Weltzien Skypark Airport (15G) to Weltzien Skypark Airport (15G)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI08CA291
- 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 172 N
- 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
- N739BX
- Operator
- Skypark
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Weltzien Skypark Airport (15G), Wadsworth, OHTo Weltzien Skypark Airport (15G), Wadsworth, OH
- 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 · landing roll
- 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
- Runway excursion
- 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 oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, not marked as estimated; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he was intending to practice his skills in the local practice area since he had not flown in 18 days. Shortly after takeoff, he decided to stay in the traffic pattern and return to practice a full-stop landing. He stated that his approach was fast and the airplane touched down past the midfield yellow marking which designates the go-around point if the airplane has not touched down. The pilot reported that as he passed the yellow line, he was concerned that if he performed a go-around, he would not be able to clear the trees at the end of the runway so he elected to continue the landing. The airplane traveled off the end of the runway, through a barricade, and down sloping terrain where it nosed over. The pilot reported that he should have flown to the practice area to get comfortable with the airplane prior to landing and/or should have made the first landing at an airport with a longer, wider runway.
Probable cause
The pilot's excessive airspeed during the approach and landing and failure to perform a go-around. Contributing to the accident were the barricade and the down-sloping terrain at the end of the runway.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI08CA291
- Event ID
- 20081004X12052
- Case number
- CHI08CA291
- 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: 9c3f85559adc1acb0d73e13ed50d874e9e315e81e528fba37709b9a65534398b; retrieved 2026-09-15T10:23:49.680Z.