WPR12FA280 · Aviat A-1C-180
Aviat A-1C-180 · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From Moose Creek US Forest Service Airport (1U1) to Coeur D'Alene Airport - Pappy Boyington Field (COE)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR12FA280
- 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
Aviat A-1C-180
- Aircraft type
- Aviat A-1
- 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
- N63WY
- Operator
- Jahn Ashtiani
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Moose Creek US Forest Service Airport (1U1), Kooskia, IDTo Coeur D'Alene Airport - Pappy Boyington Field (COE), Coeur d'Alene, ID
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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 in flight
- 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 › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The passenger reported that the pilot wanted "to beat" an approaching storm and that immediately after taking off and during the initial climb, the airplane rolled violently to the right; it then rolled back to the left, and the nose dropped before impact with terrain. A witness reported observing two men rushing to pack up their airplane while the weather at the airfield was deteriorating due to an incoming thunderstorm. He reported seeing the airplane make an uphill intersection takeoff with a strong gusting tailwind. The witness added that the airplane appeared unstable during the takeoff. A second witness reported that a thunderstorm was within one mile of the airfield and that the windsock was fully erect and moving around erratically, adding that the wind "was knocking the aircraft all over." The passenger stated that he thought the airplane was about tree top level when it encountered the violent wind condition and that the engine was running normally before the accident.
A postaccident examination of the airframe and engine revealed no mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation. The pilot's decision to attempt a downwind takeoff in gusting wind conditions, coupled with a thunderstorm in close proximity to the airfield, most likely resulted in his loss of airplane control and subsequent impact with terrain.
Probable cause
The pilot's decision to attempt a takeoff with a gusty tailwind, which resulted in his loss of airplane control during the initial climb and an aerodynamic stall/spin.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR12FA280
- Event ID
- 20120629X30512
- Case number
- WPR12FA280
- 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: 419bdf842de6dc85312154ce4527fd2c00e0b3b9ea1d56b6d86e71ef55578494; retrieved 2026-09-13T22:27:41.510Z.