GAA17CA528 · Cessna 152
Cessna 152 · Accident: loss of control in flight during landing
From Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport (BJC) to Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport (BJC)
Event
- NTSB case
- GAA17CA528
- 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 152
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 152
- 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
- N89732
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport (BJC), Broomfield, COTo Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport (BJC), Broomfield, CO
- Aircraft age
- About 38 years (built 1979)
- 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
- Landing
- 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 › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The student pilot reported that, while landing in a "strong" crosswind, the airplane touched down on the runway centerline but then veered hard to the left. He attempted to correct by using rudder and aileron inputs, but he overcorrected, and the airplane veered sharply to the right and exited the runway. He applied full throttle to abort the landing; however, the airplane veered left across the runway, then continued off its left side. The airplane continued down an embankment, the nose impacted an "upslope" on the far side of a ditch, and the airplane came to rest inverted.
The airplane sustained substantial damage to the empennage and both wings.
The student pilot reported that there were no preaccident mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation.
The automated weather observation system located about 1 mile from the accident site reported, about 15 minutes before the accident, the wind was from 190° at 13 knots and that, about 15 minutes after the accident, the wind was from 210° at 17 knots, gusting to 21 knots. The student pilot landed on runway 12R.
Probable cause
The student pilot’s failure to maintain directional control while landing in gusting crosswind conditions.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record GAA17CA528
- Event ID
- 20170911X45757
- Case number
- GAA17CA528
- 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, coordinates. 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: bf8cc0c695cf262ac593a25863829169be9cef0255532e059a03c7f5a31f55cf; retrieved 2026-09-16T05:49:39.521Z.