CEN15LA182 · Air Tractor Inc AT 400
Devil Dusters Air Tractor Inc AT 400 · Accident: flight control system malfunction/failure during initial climb
From Levelland Municipal Airport (KLLN) to Levelland Municipal Airport (KLLN)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN15LA182
- 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
Air Tractor Inc AT 400
- Aircraft type
- Air Tractor AT-400
- 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
- N136DB
- Operator
- Devil Dusters
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Levelland Municipal Airport (KLLN), Levelland, TXTo Levelland Municipal Airport (KLLN), Levelland, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 32 years (built 1983)
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Flight control system malfunction/failure
- 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 › 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 pilot reported that, shortly after takeoff on a postmaintenance test flight, the flight controls felt "stiff." The pilot flew a traffic pattern and intended to conduct a precautionary landing on the runway. However, after the pilot turned the airplane to the final leg in the traffic pattern, the airplane started to roll left. While attempting to level the wings, the pilot observed the left aileron traveling up and down. During the landing, the airplane bounced twice, rolled left, and then cartwheeled.
The airplane had undergone extensive maintenance throughout the year before the accident, and, during this maintenance, maintenance personnel reinstalled the ailerons. The accident flight was the first flight following this maintenance. A postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that the hardware that attached the long aileron pushrod to the aileron bellcrank was not present, and the hardware was not found at the accident site; therefore, it could not be determined whether new or existing hardware was installed during the recent maintenance. However, given that the flight control malfunction occurred immediately following the extensive maintenance, it is likely that maintenance personnel either did not install the attachment hardware at all or did not install it properly, either of which would have resulted in the loss of airplane control and subsequent impact with terrain.
Probable cause
The in-flight separation of the left aileron's attachment hardware at the connection between the long aileron pushrod and the left aileron bellcrank. Contributing to the accident was maintenance personnel’s improper installation of, or failure to install, the left aileron attachment hardware.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN15LA182
- Event ID
- 20150330X92930
- Case number
- CEN15LA182
- 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: d8f5c622c84375bd0c099805a18de2beeec3eab8e03009941a1d5ff7e8877ec7; retrieved 2026-09-16T02:11:44.649Z.