CEN12LA114 · Southern Powered Parachute Condor
Southern Powered Parachute Condor · Accident: flight control system malfunction/failure during takeoff
From Rogersville, MO to Rogersville, MO
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN12LA114
- 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
Southern Powered Parachute Condor
- Aircraft type
- Southern Powered Parachute CONDOR
- Category
- Powered Parachute
- 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
- UNREG
- Operator
- John Cochran
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Rogersville, MOTo Rogersville, MO
- 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
- Flight control system malfunction/failure
- 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 structures
- Environmental issues › Physical environment
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The unlicensed pilot reported that he performed a preflight inspection of the powered parachute before taking off from the grass airstrip in a hayfield. During the takeoff climb, the powered parachute entered a hard left turn. The pilot noticed that 2 to 4 of the lines attached to the leading and trailing edges of the parachute were stuck together. He pumped the left pedal, the lines came apart, and the powered parachute started to fly straight ahead. However, the powered parachute was nearing trees, and the pilot was unable to avoid a collision. After hitting a tree, the powered parachute descended uncontrolled and impacted the ground. The pilot reported that the lines were likely stuck together by straw from the hayfield that he was using as a takeoff area.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate preflight inspection of the takeoff area, which resulted in a loss of control due to the binding of the parachute's lines.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN12LA114
- Event ID
- 20111227X23942
- Case number
- CEN12LA114
- 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: 900f2e770c73d090abee946ae34fc30df26c3ddd78310aebac7b8827a97f1ac6; retrieved 2026-09-15T17:01:37.892Z.