ERA13CA164 · Piper PA-25-235
Tampa Bay Soaring Society Piper PA-25-235 · Accident: landing area overshoot
From Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0) to Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA13CA164
- 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 PA-25-235
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-25
- 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
- N7329Z
- Operator
- Tampa Bay Soaring Society
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0), Groveland, FLTo Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0), Groveland, FL
- 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 · flare/touchdown
- 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
- Landing area overshoot
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot of the tailwheel-equipped airplane reported that he was conducting glider-tow operations, which were departing into the wind; the gliders were then landing in the opposite direction with a tailwind. After an uneventful glider tow and release, the airplane was returning to the airport to conduct a second glider tow. While turning to the base leg of the airport traffic pattern, a tailwind gust caused the airplane to lose about 10 mph of airspeed. To compensate, the pilot increased engine power and increased the airspeed from 60 mph to 80 mph, where it remained until touchdown. The pilot further stated that the airplane touched down "too fast" about 600 feet down the runway. He was concerned that the airplane would collide with gliders at the end of the runway, so he applied heavy braking, which caused the airplane to nose over and come to rest inverted on the runway. Examination of the airplane revealed substantial damage to the left wing; no preimpact mechanical malfunctions that would have precluded normal airplane operation were observed, nor did the pilot report any. The pilot added that he should have performed a go-around when the tailwind gust upset the approach on base leg. Recorded weather near the accident site indicated a tailwind of 8 knots, gusting to 15 knots.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain the proper airspeed during a tailwind approach, his improper decision to continue a fast approach with a tailwind rather than go around, and his improper use of the wheel brakes during the landing roll.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA13CA164
- Event ID
- 20130313X00921
- Case number
- ERA13CA164
- 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: 46243688b1d8274ee0a35c536dd27f6505be652bf54339417d822cc6d643a396; retrieved 2026-09-15T21:04:41.094Z.