ERA13CA091 · Piper PA28R 180
Rick Aviation Piper PA28R 180 · Accident: ground collision while standing
From Newport News Williamsburg International Airport (PHF) to Newport News Williamsburg International Airport (PHF)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA13CA091
- 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
Piper PA28R 180
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA28
- 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
- N3915T
- Operator
- Rick Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Newport News Williamsburg International Airport (PHF), Newport News, VATo Newport News Williamsburg International Airport (PHF), Newport News, VA
- 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
- Standing · engine(s) start-up
- 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
- Ground collision
- 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
- Personnel issues › Psychological
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot stated that he positioned his feet on the toe brake pedals during engine start. After starting, the engine accelerated to a higher rpm than the pilot expected, and the airplane began to roll forward. The pilot pressed down with his feet, but the airplane continued to roll. After reducing the throttle to idle, the pilot attempted to steer the airplane with the rudder pedals, but they were fixed and would not move. As the airplane neared a hangar, the pilot shut down the engine with the fuel mixture control and turned the magneto switch off. The airplane then impacted the hangar, resulting in substantial damage to both wings. Postaccident examination revealed no anomalies with the rudder pedal or toe brake systems. In a postaccident statement, the pilot offered that, rather than placing his feet on the brake pedals, he inadvertently pressed on the torque tube assembly, which is part of the airframe structure located above the toe brake pedals.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to properly monitor the flight controls (toe brake pedals) during engine start.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA13CA091
- Event ID
- 20121217X51322
- Case number
- ERA13CA091
- 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: 8799afe3c5ae57c42f5247eb5268e3d2ad9ebd6a5fa3bfa2ebac0516d41b7eca; retrieved 2026-09-15T20:37:10.696Z.