CEN16LA178 · Mooney Aircraft CORP. M20K
Mooney Aircraft CORP. M20K · Accident: loss of control on ground during takeoff
From Akron Canton Regional Airport (CAK) to Akron Canton Regional Airport (CAK)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN16LA178
- 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
Mooney Aircraft CORP. M20K
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N57535
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Akron Canton Regional Airport (CAK), Akron, OHTo Akron Canton Regional Airport (CAK), Akron, OH
- Aircraft age
- About 32 years (built 1984)
- 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 on ground
- 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
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot stated that, during the takeoff roll, the airplane veered to the left and he then reduced engine power and applied full right rudder to correct. The airplane exited the runway and struck airport lighting, resulting in substantial damage. The pilot indicated a crosswind of about nine knots was reported about the time of the takeoff. Postaccident examination of the nose landing gear assembly revealed that the bolt that attached the nose landing gear retraction link to the nose gear truss assembly was missing. The bolt holes were intact and not deformed, consistent with the bolt exiting the holes because the nut was no longer retaining the bolt, rather than the bolt shearing in place. According to the manufacturer, it was possible that without the bolt, the nose wheel could be allowed to turn suddenly, and that the pilot's steering inputs would be ineffective. The investigation could not determine where or when the bolt was liberated from the nose landing gear.
Probable cause
A missing bolt in the nose landing gear assembly, which resulted in the airplane suddenly turning left and the pilot's inability to maintain directional control during a crosswind takeoff.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN16LA178
- Event ID
- 20160511X91028
- Case number
- CEN16LA178
- 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: f90d5680fc7705084d8756ebf73b4a936cf319b36634b238533ebfc2aeb3bd4a; retrieved 2026-09-16T03:22:52.371Z.