GAA16CA298 · Cessna 182 P
Cessna 182 P · Accident: abrupt maneuver during initial climb
From Bruce Meadows Airport (U63) to McCall Municipal Airport (MYL)
Event
- NTSB case
- GAA16CA298
- 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
- N1403S
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Bruce Meadows Airport (U63), Stanley, IDTo McCall Municipal Airport (MYL), MC CALL, ID
- Aircraft age
- About 40 years (built 1976)
- 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
- Abrupt maneuver
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Tree(s)
- 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, accompanied by a flight instructor, was conducting mountainous backcountry familiarization training. The flight instructor reported that they had taxied about 1,000 feet down the runway because the field was wet. During takeoff at a high altitude (6,370 feet elevation) backcountry airstrip, the pilot reported that the airplane became airborne near the end of the runway. During the initial climb, the flight instructor reported that the pilot pulled back on the yoke abruptly, which caused the nose of the airplane to pitch up and obstruct their forward view. The flight instructor further reported that he told the pilot to lower the nose of the airplane to build up airspeed and allow for a visual reference. As the pilot lowered the nose, the left wing of the airplane impacted a tree.
The flight instructor reported that he and the pilot assessed the damage and controllability of the airplane, and decided to continue their flight since they did not want to do any more maneuvering than was necessary and they were already headed towards their destination airport. During cruise flight, the flight instructor noticed some "pulling" to the left and some visual damage to the left wing. The flight instructor further reported that they landed at their destination airport uneventfully.
A postaccident examination revealed substantial damage to the left wing and aileron.
The pilot reported there were no preimpact mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airframe or engine that would have precluded normal operation.
A postaccident mechanical inspection by the pilot's mechanic revealed a 20/80 compression on the No. 3 cylinder. A representative from the engine manufacturer stated that there would have been negligible power loss due to the low compression and that the postaccident compression test would be invalid because the test was conducted on a cold engine. Included in the public docket for this report is a copy of the service bulletin from Continental on the procedures for conducting a differential pressure test and borescope inspection procedures for cylinders.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to attain an adequate climb gradient, which resulted in a collision with a tree and subsequent substantial damage to the left wing and aileron.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record GAA16CA298
- Event ID
- 20160610X32615
- Case number
- GAA16CA298
- 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: ba7d1ae3204d4661381a760e7f929fd5080133e7de62838f100fcd6cdf7f4c33; retrieved 2026-09-16T03:29:31.971Z.