WPR13CA394 · Henderson Michael E GLASTAR
Henderson Michael E GLASTAR · Accident: loss of control on ground during landing
From Seattle Paine Field International Airport (KPAE) to Sequim Valley Airport (W28)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR13CA394
- 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
Henderson Michael E GLASTAR
- Aircraft type
- Henderson Michael GLASTAR
- 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
- N789MH
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Seattle Paine Field International Airport (KPAE), Everett, WATo Sequim Valley Airport (W28), Sequim, WA
- Aircraft age
- About 9 years (built 2004)
- 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 · landing roll
- 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 on ground
- 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 › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot landed the experimental nose wheel-equipped airplane 500 feet beyond the landing threshold of the grass runway, having performed a full-flap, power-off approach. The runway was traversed by two asphalt taxiways, and during the ground roll, he observed a depression in the turf just before the first taxiway intersection. He then applied back pressure to the elevator control; however, the nose wheel dug into the depression, and the airplane nosed over. The fuselage and wings were substantially damaged. The runway was normally 3,500 foot long, but at the time of the accident, the second half was closed. This was reflected in a NOTAM (notice to airmen), and the pilot was unaware of the closure. According to the airport manager, the depression was a drainage ditch, and was located to the left of runway, adjacent to the parallel asphalt runway. The pilot reported no preimpact mechanical malfunction or failure with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation.
Probable cause
The pilot's improper soft field landing technique, and failure to maintain aircraft control during the landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR13CA394
- Event ID
- 20130901X10646
- Case number
- WPR13CA394
- 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: 8a1d7aaaf2d81da1603b68423bbf2e5c80abf5e20cea1c5e7366f5e24c91b953; retrieved 2026-09-15T22:41:32.376Z.