CEN15LA059 · Ross H/Herriott M VANS AIRCRAFT RV 3 UNDESIGNAT
Ross H/Herriott M VANS AIRCRAFT RV 3 UNDESIGNAT · Accident: loss of control in flight during takeoff
From Las Cruces International Airport (LRU) to 5T6 · Santa Teresa, NM
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN15LA059
- 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
- 1 · 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
Ross H/Herriott M VANS AIRCRAFT RV 3 UNDESIGNAT
- Aircraft type
- Ross H/herriott VANS AIRCRAFT RV 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
- N625ZH
- Operator
- Tyler Francis
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Las Cruces International Airport (LRU), Las Cruces, NMTo 5T6 · Santa Teresa, NM
- Aircraft age
- About 17 years (built 1997)
- 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 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Several witnesses reported that they observed the airplane make a steep climb shortly after takeoff and that the airplane then made two 90-degree left bank turns to enter the downwind leg of the traffic pattern. During the turns, the airplane's wings were rocking back and forth, the airplane was in a nose-high attitude and not climbing, and the flight control surfaces were moving. The airplane then began another left turn, the left wing dropped, and the airplane spun toward the ground. One witness reported that the engine sounded normal throughout the flight. A friend of the pilot stated that the pilot had purchased the airplane 2 days before the accident and had no previous flight experience in the airplane make and model. He estimated that the pilot had only flown the airplane about 4.0 hours before the accident. Based on witness accounts, there were no preaccident anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. Therefore, it is likely that the pilot lost control of the airplane while maneuvering in the traffic pattern, which resulted in a stall/spin. It is also likely that the pilot's lack of experience in the airplane type contributed to his failure to maintain airplane control during the turns. Although postaccident toxicology tests detected a low level of marijuana in the pilot's blood, liver, and lung, it is unlikely that it impaired his performance on the day of the accident.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to maintain airplane control, which resulted in a stall/spin. Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s failure to obtain adequate familiarization in the accident airplane type before the accident.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN15LA059
- Event ID
- 20141124X61240
- Case number
- CEN15LA059
- 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: 5c3d7d45ffc80c98b0aef2e25b591a962a9f0eca71fd7c4901a5a8b7104aec2c; retrieved 2026-09-14T17:29:06.467Z.