WPR10LA195 · Snow ROCKET F1
Snow ROCKET F1 · Accident: flight control system malfunction/failure while maneuvering
From Borrego Springs, CA to Borrego Valley Airport (L08)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR10LA195
- 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
- 1 · 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
Snow ROCKET F1
- Aircraft type
- Snow ROCKET F1
- 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
- N28VS
- Operator
- Snow Van e
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Borrego Springs, CATo Borrego Valley Airport (L08), Borrego Springs, 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
- Maneuvering · aerobatics
- 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
- Flight control system malfunction/failure
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was practicing aerobatics in preparation for a local aerobatic competition. A witness on the ground observed the pilot's practice sessions as well as monitored his radio communications. The pilot flew into the designated aerobatic box and performed an aerobatic sequence twice. The pilot then performed a spin maneuver and departed the aerobatic box. The witness recalled that the pilot was requested to repeat a maneuver and reentered the aerobatic box at an altitude between 2,700 and 3,000 feet above ground level (agl). The airplane entered a 30- to 35-degree nose-down descent angle to begin his sequence. Shortly thereafter, the pilot made a radio transmission in the blind saying "I have no back stick." The witness estimated that the airplane was descending through about 1,800 to 2,000 feet agl when the witness heard someone ask the pilot if the airplane was under control. The pilot responded that it was not. A few seconds later, the witness heard another transmission telling the pilot to use the airplane’s trim; the pilot responded that "there is no trim" as the airplane was observed descending through about 600 feet agl. No further radio transmissions were heard from the pilot and the airplane continued to steepen its descent angle just before ground impact.
A postaccident examination revealed that the elevator flight control system exhibited numerous areas of separations consistent with overload from the rear control stick to the elevator control surface. The front and rear control sticks were found separated from their control columns. The interconnected control column, portions of the separated front and rear control sticks, elevator control servo, and portions of control rod were found to be fractured due to overstress. Examination of the front control stick revealed that it was fractured in overstress due to cantilever bending just above the control column fitting; the fracture initiated at a 0.22-inch diameter hole drilled into the front wall of the stick tube. The upper portion of the front control stick was not located. The chemical composition and hardness of the front and rear control sticks were within specifications.
Probable cause
The pilot's inability to maintain control due to the in-flight failure and separation of the pilot's flight control stick. The reason for the flight control stick failure could not be determined.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR10LA195
- Event ID
- 20100408X95622
- Case number
- WPR10LA195
- 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: 359479a82e95638783b026d87ee580f40167d1837f8197c23938041efa3b8e9c; retrieved 2026-09-13T20:45:19.989Z.