ERA14LA422 · Ackland Jeffrey Dean SH 3R
Ackland Jeffrey Dean SH 3R · Accident: landing gear collapse during takeoff
From Columbus Airport (CSG) to Bob Sikes Airport (CEW)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA14LA422
- 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
Ackland Jeffrey Dean SH 3R
- Aircraft type
- Ackland Jeffrey Dean SH-3
- 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
- N333AW
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Columbus Airport (CSG), Columbus, GATo Bob Sikes Airport (CEW), Crestview, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 24 years (built 1990)
- 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 · rejected 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
- Landing gear collapse
- 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 systems
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was returning the airplane to his home base following an avionics installation. During the takeoff roll, about 80 knots, the canopy handle vibrated to the open position, and the canopy opened. As the pilot was rejecting the takeoff, the landing gear retracted. The pilot was unable to maintain directional control, and the airplane departed the runway; the left wing struck a taxiway sign, resulting in structural damage. Examination of the aircraft after the accident revealed that the landing gear extend/retract switch was installed upside-down in the newly-replaced instrument panel. The switch was in the "retract" position during preflight and takeoff; however, the safety squat switch on the landing gear prevented gear retraction while on the ground. Once weight was removed from the landing gear during the takeoff sequence, the switch commanded the landing gear to retract. The mechanic who installed the instrument panel did not perform a functional gear check (gear swing) prior to releasing the airplane to the owner.
Probable cause
The mechanic’s improper installation of the landing gear extend/retract switch, which resulted in the retraction of the landing gear during the aborted takeoff.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA14LA422
- Event ID
- 20140904X85723
- Case number
- ERA14LA422
- 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: e0e9f7e9ac19c4f78da4bb25b8f543815460a91ea6fc3d5e60af36a19889fc50; retrieved 2026-09-16T01:43:27.006Z.