CEN16LA131 · Cessna 180A
Cessna 180A · Accident: runway excursion during takeoff
From Del Rio International Airport (KDRT) to Terlingua, TX (private airstrip)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN16LA131
- 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
Cessna 180A
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 180
- 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
- N9659B
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Del Rio International Airport (KDRT), Del Rio, TXTo Terlingua, TX (private airstrip)
- Aircraft age
- About 59 years (built 1957)
- 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
- Runway excursion
- 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 › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The private pilot and passenger were departing runway 31 in a tailwheel-equipped airplane. During the takeoff, just as the tail became airborne, the airplane veered right. The pilot was unable to correct the turn, and the airplane departed the runway. An examination of the wheels and brakes did not reveal any abnormalities. About the time of departure, the reported winds were from 130 degrees at 11 knots, gusting to 17 knots. Based on the pilot's choice of runway direction and the wind conditions at the time of takeoff, it is likely that he lost control while departing with a gusting tailwind.
Probable cause
The pilot’s loss of directional control while departing with a gusting tailwind.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN16LA131
- Event ID
- 20160328X03156
- Case number
- CEN16LA131
- 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: c524d7211512322b2539445741ebcca742c304a1c84301259079d84044d9e679; retrieved 2026-09-16T03:14:36.876Z.