CEN09LA278 · Glasflugel H201B
Glasflugel H201B · Accident: glider tow event during takeoff
From 00V · Meadow Lake, CO to 00V · Meadow Lake, CO
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's location. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN09LA278
- 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
Glasflugel H201B
- Aircraft type
- Glasflugel H201
- 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
- N17TD
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 00V · Meadow Lake, COTo 00V · Meadow Lake, CO
- 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
- 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
- Glider tow event
- 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 › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The glider flight was being conducted to test the operation of a prototype winch launch system utilizing a computer aided launch control (CALC) hydrostatic system. During the launch, a programming anomaly within CALC limited the maximum winch speed to 32 miles per hour, causing the winch cable to release as the glider climbed away from the ground. The pilot pushed the nose of the glider down, but insufficient altitude was available to recover the glider. The glider impacted the runway in a level attitude, cracking the fuselage.
Probable cause
A programming anomaly within the winch's computer aided launch control system, which incorrectly limited the maximum winch speed during launch of the glider.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN09LA278
- Event ID
- 20090505X75616
- Case number
- CEN09LA278
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Source notes (5)
- 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: 538da848255ab57e30825ff1a77d1a1092c4d8ecea3e49a08fb84007a37263f1; retrieved 2026-09-15T11:01:14.607Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: departure, destination. Letter O in place of zeros; Meadow Lake Airport's identifier is 00V. Letter O in place of zeros; Meadow Lake Airport's identifier is 00V.