ERA13LA229 · Schweizer SGS 2-33A
Civil Air Patrol Schweizer SGS 2-33A · Accident: flight control system malfunction/failure during initial climb
From Van Sant Airport (9N1) to Van Sant Airport (9N1)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA13LA229
- 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
Schweizer SGS 2-33A
- Aircraft type
- Schweizer SGS-2
- Category
- Glider
- 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
- N2045T
- Operator
- Civil Air Patrol
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Van Sant Airport (9N1), Erwinna, PATo Van Sant Airport (9N1), Erwinna, PA
- Aircraft age
- About 36 years (built 1977)
- 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
- Flight control system malfunction/failure
- 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 › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The glider pilot intended to practice stalls after being towed to an altitude of 3,000 feet mean sea level. Shortly after takeoff, the tow pilot observed the glider yaw left, then right, and then left again. He added that, for most of the tow, the glider appeared to be above the normal tow position with its nose pointed 45 degrees right. About 400 feet above ground level, the glider pilot released the tow line, and the glider turned about 180 degrees left; its right wing then impacted trees, and the glider pitched down and impacted terrain. Postaccident examination of the wreckage revealed that the rudder control cables were rigged backward. The accident flight was the first flight following the glider's most recent annual inspection. Before the annual inspection, the rudder had been removed for repair then re-installed. The mechanic who conducted a flight control check after the annual inspection with assistance from another pilot seated in the cockpit stated that he confirmed movement of the rudder while at the rear of the glider; however, he did not see which pedal the pilot was pushing and did not verbally confirm the corresponding position of the rudder pedals. If the pilot had conducted a thorough preflight inspection, he should have been able to detect that the rudder control cables were rigged backward.
Probable cause
The pilot’s loss of glider control due to improper rigging of the rudder control cables, the mechanic’s inadequate flight control checks following the glider’s most recent annual inspection, and the pilot’s failure to perform a thorough preflight inspection.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA13LA229
- Event ID
- 20130507X03740
- Case number
- ERA13LA229
- 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: 5b80b3c124fe82a50c1e9a949e05f19240cf8a6ad7f0971f5605f1aa23d063f3; retrieved 2026-09-15T21:25:34.780Z.