CEN17LA283 · Cessna 180
Up Above Austin Cessna 180 · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From Austin, TX to Austin, TX
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN17LA283
- 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 180
- 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
- N3119D
- Operator
- Up Above Austin
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Austin, TXTo Austin, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 62 years (built 1955)
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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 as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The commercial pilot was attempting to take off from a lake for an air tour flight with two passengers onboard. He noted that, after accelerating to get on step, it took "a bit longer than usual" to do so due to a high outside air temperature and choppy water conditions, which he realized could affect the airplane's performance. The airplane hit some waves just before reaching a takeoff speed about 45 mph, lifted off briefly, settled back down, and bounced twice. All indications appeared normal, and the airplane began to climb, but the pilot did not "feel" the usual acceleration after the airplane lifted off the water. Once the airplane was flying in ground effect, the pilot leveled it off a little to increase the airspeed, but the airspeed did not increase. After reaching between about 25 and 35 ft above the water, the airplane began descending, and it could not maintain altitude or airspeed. The pilot pitched the airplane's nose down a little to increase the airspeed, but the airspeed did not substantially increase, and the airplane began descending faster. The airplane's left pontoon impacted the water, which collapsed and then contacted the rotating propeller.
Postaccident examination of the airplane revealed no evidence of any preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation. The Airplane Flying Handbook stated, in part, that, "under conditions of …high temperature, and/or maximum gross weight, the airplane may be able to lift off but will be unable to climb out of ground effect." After the accident and upon request, the pilot provided the Federal Aviation Administration investigator weight and balance calculations for the accident flight, which showed that the airplane was either at or above its maximum gross weight. This in conjunction with the high outside air temperature likely degraded the airplane's performance, which prevented it from being able to sustain a climb. The pilot was aware that such conditions could affect the airplane's performance and should not have attempted to take off.
Probable cause
The pilot's improper decision to attempt to take off after two previous failed attempts from choppy water with a high outside temperature and the airplane near its maximum gross weight, which degraded the airplane’s performance and resulted in its inability to maintain adequate airspeed and sustain a climb.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN17LA283
- Event ID
- 20170724X70559
- Case number
- CEN17LA283
- 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: 1a408c950ff73a76cde0f46590d2f7b7640edd8afefb5436cc92f4d5a314e8ab; retrieved 2026-09-16T05:35:54.346Z.