ANC17LA052 · Cessna A185 F
Cessna A185 F · Accident: part(s) separation from aircraft while taxiing
From Aniak Airport (ANI) to Aniak, AK
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC17LA052
- 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 A185 F
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 185
- 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
- N92DC
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Aniak Airport (ANI), Aniak, AKTo Aniak, AK
- Aircraft age
- About 42 years (built 1975)
- 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
- Taxi
- 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
- Part(s) separation from aircraft
- 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 propeller/rotor
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot/operator was taxiing the airplane for takeoff. While the airplane was moving about 15 mph and about 2,700 rpm, a blade from the metal two-blade propeller separated. After the separation, the pilot maintained control of the airplane and shut down the airplane. The engine mount sustained substantial damage from excessive vibrations caused by the propeller blade separation.
An examination of the fractured propeller blade revealed that it had failed due to fatigue cracking that had initiated from a nick in the leading edge. Measurement of the nick revealed it was within tolerance for a field repair although a field repair had not been performed.
The airplane was frequently used at unpaved runways and airstrips in remote locations. It is likely a nick was sustained on the propeller during the backcountry operations; however, it could not be determined when that nick occurred or when the fatigue crack was initiated.
The airplane manufacturer owner's manual indicates that the propeller should be checked for nicks during the preflight inspection. It is likely the pilot/operator did not adequately inspect the propeller during the preflight inspection. Had an adequate inspection been completed, the nick likely would have been identified and could have been field repaired.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate preflight inspection, which failed to detect a crack in the propeller blade, which led to the separation of a section of a propeller blade due to fatigue.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC17LA052
- Event ID
- 20170821X20801
- Case number
- ANC17LA052
- 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: e92f9ff69b9610549ec250dd11a422b942b039f55f671b3c73dd37525b80a6ba; retrieved 2026-09-16T05:43:51.538Z.