CEN14LA387 · Aeronca 11AC
Father John 77 Flying Club Aeronca 11AC · Accident: loss of control on ground during takeoff
From Dalton Airport (3DA) to Dalton Airport (3DA)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN14LA387
- 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
Aeronca 11AC
- Aircraft type
- Aeronca 11
- 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
- N4453P
- Operator
- Father John 77 Flying Club
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Dalton Airport (3DA), Flushing, MITo Dalton Airport (3DA), Flushing, MI
- Aircraft age
- About 68 years (built 1946)
- 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
- Takeoff
- 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 › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The purpose of the flight was for the pilot receiving instruction to obtain a checkout in the tailwheel-equipped airplane. The pilot receiving instruction stated that, during the takeoff roll and before the tail became airborne, the airplane suddenly swerved right, and he was unable to correct to the left with normal flight control and brake inputs. When the pilot receiving instruction was unable to regain directional control with normal flight control inputs, the flight instructor, who did not have access to brake controls, applied additional engine power and left rudder input; however, the airplane continued to swerve right. The flight instructor subsequently reduced engine power, but the airplane continued off the right side of the runway and collided with a hangar.
A postaccident airplane examination did not reveal any anomalies with the airplane's flight controls, brake system, or tailwheel assembly that would have prevented normal operation. Although the 5-knot wind was likely variable at the time of the accident, the pilot receiving instruction should have been able to maintain directional control without excessive flight control and brake inputs. Additionally, during the takeoff roll, before the flight controls became more effective at higher ground speeds, the flight instructor likely had inadequate control authority to regain directional control without access to brake controls.
Probable cause
The pilot receiving instruction’s failure to maintain directional control during the takeoff roll. Contributing to the accident was the flight instructor not having access to brake controls, which limited his ability to regain directional control at slower ground speeds.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN14LA387
- Event ID
- 20140723X01838
- Case number
- CEN14LA387
- 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, coordinates. 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: 21b87023abe40b5b3f1913d03044af59e9c2c7db185225c565e76cc16a1fe01c; retrieved 2026-09-16T00:58:04.994Z.