ERA10IA095 · Beech 58
Air Lexington Beech 58 · Incident: system/component malfunction/failure (non-power) on approach
From Blue Grass Airport (LEX) to Blue Grass Airport (LEX)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA10IA095
- 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
- Incident
- 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
Beech 58
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 58
- 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
- N391MC
- Operator
- Air Lexington
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Blue Grass Airport (LEX), Lexington, KYTo Blue Grass Airport (LEX), Lexington, KY
- 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
- Approach · VFR go-around
- 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
- System/component malfunction/failure (non-power)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Minor
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilots were practicing instrument approaches and performed a missed approach. At that time, the landing gear was retracted and the corresponding gear retracted cockpit indication was noted; however, the approach controller advised the pilots that the nose landing gear appeared to remain in the extended position. The pilots then selected the nose landing gear to the extended position and noted the corresponding gear extended cockpit indication. During a subsequent landing, the nose landing gear collapsed and the airplane slid to a stop on the runway. Examination of the airplane revealed that the right side of the nose landing gear aft drag brace had separated. Metallurgical examination revealed that the origin point of the fracture was consistent with overstress, and the fracture extended from the origin point over a significant period of time. The airplane had accumulated over 10,000 hours of flight time, and the initiation of the overstress event was most likely the result of a previous hard landing or landings. Review of the maintenance manual for the make and model airplane revealed that the nose gear was an "on condition" inspection item; however, the fracture was in an area that would not be easily visible or detected by a mechanic during an inspection.
Probable cause
The overstress failure of the nose landing gear aft drag brace.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA10IA095
- Event ID
- 20091211X04629
- Case number
- ERA10IA095
- 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: 125fc6fcd28c1d2925bf289be44e9e8522a6a79a892e1dfc580a0973eca91015; retrieved 2026-09-15T13:34:02.764Z.