CEN15FA425 · Cessna T310Q Q
Cessna T310Q Q · Accident: flight control system malfunction/failure during initial climb
From Wichita Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport (ICT) to Centennial Airport (APA)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN15FA425
- 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
Cessna T310Q Q
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 310
- 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
- N301JA
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Wichita Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport (ICT), Wichita, KSTo Centennial Airport (APA), Denver, CO
- Aircraft age
- About 43 years (built 1972)
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The commercial pilot was departing on a personal cross-country flight in the airplane. During initial climb after takeoff, witnesses saw the airplane suddenly pitch down into a rapid descent that continued to ground impact. Postaccident examination revealed that the elevator trim pushrod was attached to the trim tab but not attached to the trim tab actuator. The bolt, nut, and cotter pin securing the elevator trim tab pushrod to the actuator were missing and not recovered. Examinations of the elevator and the pushrod revealed that the pushrod became jammed aft of the forward elevator spar creating an abnormally large trim tab up (nose down) condition.
Measurements taken from an exemplar airplane of the same make and model as the accident airplane indicated that the elevator trim tab deflection with the pushrod jammed aft of the forward elevator spar would be over three times the normal maximum trailing-edge-up deflection. The airplane nose-down pitching moment at this increased deflection would create a forward force on the control yoke that a pilot would likely not be able to overcome.
Following the accident, the manufacturer issued a service bulletin that required the hardware securing the elevator trim pushrod be replaced and specified the hardware to be used. Subsequently, the Federal Aviation Administration issued an airworthiness directive that required compliance with the service bulletin.
Although the pilot's toxicology results were positive for ethanol in muscle tissue, when detected only in the muscle tissue, ethanol is likely from a source other than ingestion. No medications or illicit drugs were found that could pose hazards to flight safety.
Probable cause
The separation of the attachment hardware connecting the elevator trim tab pushrod to the elevator trim actuator, which resulted in the elevator trim tab jamming in a position outside the limits of normal travel and a subsequent loss of airplane control.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN15FA425
- Event ID
- 20150925X82452
- Case number
- CEN15FA425
- 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: 8b79a8979757b10dd3377d4a9f1faa04e2f04033322e6da6182a312fff4a2bed; retrieved 2026-09-14T21:31:32.554Z.