WPR12CA269 · Cessna 170B
Inter-State Aviation Cessna 170B · Accident: loss of control on ground during landing
From Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport (KPUW) to Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport (KPUW)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR12CA269
- 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 170B
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 170
- 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
- N2580D
- Operator
- Inter-State Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport (KPUW), Pullman, WATo Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport (KPUW), Pullman, WA
- 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 · landing roll
- 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
- Loss of control on ground
- 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
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flight instructor was providing tailwheel instruction to a pilot who was going to purchase the accident airplane. They had completed 10.7 hours and 56 landings. Because the pilot planned to depart the following morning with the current airplane owner, the flight instructor said that he felt pressure to complete the pilot’s training that day. While practicing three point landings, the wind was gusting to 19 knots. After touchdown, the airplane began tracking to the right. The flight instructor stated that he was guarding the controls closely but delayed assuming control of the airplane to let the pilot correct the situation on his own. The airplane then swerved to the right, and the flight instructor was unable to regain directional control despite full application of left rudder and brake. When the airplane ran off the runway, the airplane’s left wing and aft fuselage were damaged. The flight instructor reported no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to maintain directional control of the airplane while landing in gusting crosswind conditions and the flight instructor’s delayed remedial action.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR12CA269
- Event ID
- 20120619X40324
- Case number
- WPR12CA269
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2012-06-19.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 931c469813b0453e8590d5478cb76b6d762eb3411d2d8110a88c91ad5bfae48e; retrieved 2026-09-15T18:34:08.129Z.