WPR09LA222 · Valentin TAIFUN 17 E II
Valentin TAIFUN 17 E II · Accident: collision with terrain/object (non-CFIT)
From Tonopah Airport (TPH) to Modesto City Co-Harry Sham Field (MOD)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR09LA222
- 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
- 2 · 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
Valentin TAIFUN 17 E II
- Aircraft type
- Valentin TAIFUN 17
- 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
- N20822
- Operator
- Allen R Melendy · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Tonopah Airport (TPH), Tonopah, NVTo Modesto City Co-Harry Sham Field (MOD), Modesto, CA
- 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
- Unknown
- 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
- Collision with terrain/object (non-CFIT)
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Tree(s)
- 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
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The motor-glider wreckage was located in mountainous terrain at an elevation of about 8,000-feet. The wreckage debris path was dispersed throughout trees and extended for 325 feet in a shallow canyon. The nearest weather reporting station, located about 10 miles from the accident site, indicated that around the time of departure, there was a cloud ceiling at 4,200 feet with calm wind. The ceiling observation was lowered to 3,300 feet about 2 hours later, with the wind gusting from 10 to 24 knots. Postaccident inspection of the airframe and engine revealed no anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. The circumstances leading up to the accident could not be determined.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain clearance from terrain while maneuvering in a canyon.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR09LA222
- Event ID
- 20090501X70125
- Case number
- WPR09LA222
- 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. 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: 82a6ac9f7036a3fef5e0dcbe301a580b1106696038b71b85213b74e5a80ccd08; retrieved 2026-09-13T20:06:16.350Z.