ERA13LA058 · Cessna 172RG
Eastern Kentucky University Cessna 172RG · Accident: system/component malfunction/failure (non-power) on approach
From I39 · Richmond, KY to Warren County Airport/John Lane Field (I68)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA13LA058
- 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 172RG
- 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
- N9985B
- Operator
- Eastern Kentucky University
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From I39 · Richmond, KYTo Warren County Airport/John Lane Field (I68), Lebanon, OH
- 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 pattern final
- 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
- System/component malfunction/failure (non-power)
- 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 systems
- Aircraft › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Upon arrival at the intended destination airport during an instructional flight, the pilot receiving instruction attempted to extend the airplane's landing gear. Only the nose gear and the left main landing gear extended and locked in the down position. Both pilots reported they attempted to retract the landing gear; however, the left main landing gear remained in the down and locked position and the nose landing gear's position could not be determined. The flight instructor reported that he performed the emergency gear extension procedure specified in the airplane's flight manual, but the right main landing gear did not extend or lock into position. The pilots elected to divert to a nearby airport. During the landing roll, the airplane veered off the runway, resulting in substantial damage to the elevator. An examination of the airplane revealed that a landing gear pressure hose had ruptured and the hydraulic fluid was depleted. It was constructed of material similar to that used in the automotive industry, thus, the hose likely was not an approved airplane part. No logbook entry was provided that disclosed when the hose was replaced or inspected. Because of the rupture, the lack of hydraulic fluid within the system precluded the right main landing gear from extending and locking as well as the left main and nose landing gear from retracting.
Probable cause
The rupture of the landing gear’s hydraulic pressure hose, which resulted in the depletion of all of the hydraulic fluid, and the inability of the landing gear to raise or lower. Contributing to the accident was the installation of an unapproved hydraulic hose by unknown maintenance personnel.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA13LA058
- Event ID
- 20121115X55729
- Case number
- ERA13LA058
- 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, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2012-11-15.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 756be9927e85cb9396a030a5eeda2360371c6e0e27d49226866954ca8312bba0; retrieved 2026-09-15T20:26:13.496Z.