CEN14CA246 · North American SNJ 6
Symington Management Services North American SNJ 6 · Accident: loss of control in flight during landing
From Santa Fe Municipal Airport (SAF) to Santa Fe Municipal Airport (SAF)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN14CA246
- 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
North American SNJ 6
- Aircraft type
- North American SNJ-6
- 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
- N5485V
- Operator
- Symington Management Services
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Santa Fe Municipal Airport (SAF), Santa Fe, NMTo Santa Fe Municipal Airport (SAF), Santa Fe, NM
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot had planned an overhead traffic pattern, which provided for better visibility when he sat in the rear seat. While on downwind the pilot was directed to extend downwind and fly a straight-in approach. The pilot accepted the instructions, knowing his visibility for landing would be restricted and he would likely have to drop the nose of the airplane on approach to see forward during landing. The pilot landed "a bit fast" after dropping the nose, and a light crosswind possibly pushed the airplane right. The pilot over corrected to the left and added power to go around. The airplane skidded left and exited the runway, causing the right main gear to collapse and the right wing and prop to strike the ground. In his statement, the pilot did not indicate there was any malfunctions with the airplane prior to the accident.
Probable cause
The pilot's loss of directional control during landing and subsequent go around attempt.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN14CA246
- Event ID
- 20140521X10449
- Case number
- CEN14CA246
- 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: df40ca05763d2de9e42c141c0fbd1f3bff7796a8858b729ca4f532a2d8ed8f3d; retrieved 2026-09-15T23:38:33.973Z.