ERA10CA289 · Cessna 172N
Cessna 172N · Accident: controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT) on approach
From Plum Island Airport (2B2) to Sterling Airport (3B3)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's departure or destination. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA10CA289
- 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 172N
- 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
- N6371D
- Operator
- Savard Paula K
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route Narrative disagrees
- From Plum Island Airport (2B2), Newbury Port, MATo Sterling Airport (3B3), Sterling, MA
- 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
- Controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT)
- 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
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot entered the traffic pattern for runway 34 based on the prevailing wind. She observed the wind sock change to favor runway 16 and in response she maneuvered the airplane for a runway 16 landing. The wind changed direction again to favor runway 34 and she maneuvered the airplane to that runway. She thought the airplane was too high over the touchdown zone and elected to perform a go-around. The passenger in the right seat panicked and started screaming, so the pilot discontinued the go-around, closed the throttle, and the airplane settled into the trees past the runway’s end. The airplane sustained structural damage to the wings and fuselage. The pilot reported no preaccident mechanical anomalies with the airplane.
Probable cause
The pilot’s decision to not continue with the go-around, which resulted in a collision with trees. Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s distraction due to the passenger’s panicked condition.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA10CA289
- Event ID
- 20100531X13750
- Case number
- ERA10CA289
- 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: 09ddcb88561bc801ed53bcd63a9f02ae878ef815e416ac0a09632d304b11a5cb; retrieved 2026-09-15T14:16:49.251Z.