CEN12LA234 · Cessna LC41-550FG
Cessna LC41-550FG · Accident: runway excursion during landing
From Flagstaff Pulliam Airport (FLG) to Telluride Regional Airport (TEX)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN12LA234
- 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 LC41-550FG
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 41
- 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
- N1178L
- Operator
- Performance By Design
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Flagstaff Pulliam Airport (FLG), Flagstaff, AZTo Telluride Regional Airport (TEX), Telluride, 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
- Landing
- 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
- Runway excursion
- 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
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
After an uneventful cross-country flight, the pilot announced to air traffic control his intention to enter the traffic pattern on right base leg for runway 9, even though there was a slight tailwind. After crossing over the numbers, the airplane floated longer than the pilot anticipated and touched down just before the 3,000-foot marker. The touchdown was straight and centered. The pilot felt comfortable that he had plenty of runway to safely bring the airplane to a stop and was expecting a smooth and straight rollout. Soon after touchdown, the airplane pulled to the left, and the pilot responded by applying brakes, with more pressure on the right brake. The airplane corrected slightly, and he eased off the brakes. The airplane was still pulling left, so he repeated the process of right-dominated braking, but the plane continued to pull left. At this point, the pilot realized that he was not going to be able to keep the airplane on the runway. He considered locking up the brakes and “riding it out” but thought that he could execute a go-around. According to the pilot, he advanced the throttle and eased back on the control stick, and the engine did not respond. The airplane nosed up, stalled, and came down off the left side of the runway. Examination of the flight controls and brake system did not show any preexisting mechanical malfunction or failures that would have precluded normal operation. The reason for the engine’s lack of response, as reported by the pilot, when he tried to initiate a go-around could not be verified. It is unknown whether a go-around with normal throttle response so late in the landing/rollout sequence could have prevented the accident. The reported wind at the airport about 5 minutes before the accident was from 270 degrees at 12 knots, gusting to 16 knots. Since the pilot landed on runway 9, the airplane would have encountered a direct tailwind of at least 12 knots, not taking into account the reported 16-knot gusts. It is likely that the tailwind influenced the airplane’s pull to the left after touchdown.
Probable cause
The pilot's decision to land with a direct tailwind, which resulted in a loss of directional control, and his subsequent decision to attempt a go-around so late in the landing roll, which resulted in a stall.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN12LA234
- Event ID
- 20120409X20609
- Case number
- CEN12LA234
- 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: be83835093cd4be5c05cfd50887936c47767afac0f0e921477ff5494a245ed33; retrieved 2026-09-15T17:41:20.339Z.