CEN18FA009 · Cessna 182H H
Aero Newton Cessna 182H H · Accident: controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT) while maneuvering
From Las Cruces International Airport (LRU) to Las Cruces International Airport (LRU)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN18FA009
- 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
- 2 · 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 182H H
- 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
- N8338S
- Operator
- Aero Newton
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Las Cruces International Airport (LRU), Las Cruces, NMTo Las Cruces International Airport (LRU), Las Cruces, NM
- Aircraft age
- About 52 years (built 1965)
- 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
- Maneuvering
- 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
- Controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT)
- 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
- Personnel issues › Psychological
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flight instructor and student pilot were returning to their home airport in dark night visual meteorological conditions. Radar captured the airplane's progress as it flew toward the airport. The airplane maneuvered north of the airport, descended to about 200 ft above ground level (agl), turned left toward the airport, climbed to about 500 ft agl, and overflew the airport before turning north. Shortly thereafter, the airplane entered a descending right turn and subsequently impacted terrain in a left-wing-low attitude. The airplane was mostly consumed by a postimpact fire.
The airplane's altimeter at the accident site indicated an altitude about 3,650 ft higher than the accident site elevation; however, impact and fire damage precluded functional testing of the altimeter and the reason for the discrepancy could not be determined. No other anomalies were detected with the airframe or engine that would have precluded normal operation.
The area north of the airport and in the vicinity of the accident site was unpopulated with no cultural lighting. Due to the lack of ground lighting and the dark night conditions, the pilots would have had few visual references by which to perceive their altitude and proximity to terrain. Although such conditions are conducive to the development of spatial disorientation; the airplane's radar track and impact attitude are consistent with a controlled flight into terrain event rather than a loss of control due to spatial disorientation. The reason for the pilots' maneuvering at low altitude could not be determined based on the available information.
Probable cause
Controlled flight into terrain in dark night conditions.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN18FA009
- Event ID
- 20171013X83912
- Case number
- CEN18FA009
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2017-10-13.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 03eefc15b864c71627a54f7f8548ec000c40952a0a5cece359cda15f14fa618d; retrieved 2026-09-15T06:21:28.010Z.