GAA16CA271 · Cessna 182 P
Cessna 182 P · Accident: aerodynamic stall/spin during takeoff
From Elk River Airport (ID85) to Moose Creek US Forest Service Airport (1U1)
Event
- NTSB case
- GAA16CA271
- 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 182 P
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 182
- 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
- N21242
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Elk River Airport (ID85), Elk River, IDTo Moose Creek US Forest Service Airport (1U1), MOOSE CREEK RANGER STATION, ID
- Aircraft age
- About 44 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
- 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
- Aerodynamic stall/spin
- 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 › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that during takeoff with a tailwind, about 20-30 feet above the ground, the airplane aerodynamically stalled then impacted the ground.
The airplane sustained substantial damage to the left wing.
According to the pilot there were no preimpact mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airframe or engine that would have precluded normal operation.
The Federal Aviation Administration has published the Airplane Flying Handbook FAA-H-8083-3A (2004). This handbook discusses stalls and states in part:
The key to stall awareness is the pilot's ability to visualize the wing's angle of attack in any particular circumstance, and thereby be able to estimate his/her margin of safety above stall. This is a learned skill that must be acquired early in flight training and carried through the pilot's entire flying career. The pilot must understand and appreciate factors such as airspeed, pitch attitude, load factor, relative wind, power setting, and aircraft configuration in order to develop a reasonably accurate mental picture of the wing's angle of attack at any particular time. It is essential to flight safety that a pilot takes into consideration this visualization of the wing's angle of attack prior to entering any flight maneuver.
Stall accidents usually result from an inadvertent stall at a low altitude in which a recovery was not accomplished prior to contact with the surface.
Probable cause
The pilot exceeded the critical angle of attack during takeoff which resulted in an aerodynamic stall and impact with terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record GAA16CA271
- Event ID
- 20160601X23412
- Case number
- GAA16CA271
- 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: d0576dd3e20a70f8070c42621cfa4800bf4260c4f76626d64f7295fef2590f17; retrieved 2026-09-16T03:27:04.592Z.