GAA18CA282 · Diamond Aircraft IND Inc DA 20 C1
Falcon Aviation Academy Diamond Aircraft IND Inc DA 20 C1 · Accident: loss of control on ground during takeoff
From Newnan Coweta County Airport (CCO) to LaGrange Callaway Airport (LGC)
Event
- NTSB case
- GAA18CA282
- 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
Diamond Aircraft IND Inc DA 20 C1
- Aircraft type
- Diamond DA-20
- 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
- N143MA
- Operator
- Falcon Aviation Academy
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Newnan Coweta County Airport (CCO), Atlanta, GATo LaGrange Callaway Airport (LGC), LaGrange, GA
- Aircraft age
- About 15 years (built 2003)
- 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
- Takeoff
- 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 on ground
- 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 flight instructor reported that, during a soft-field takeoff, the student kept the stick back and allowed the airplane's nose to rise. The airplane drifted to the left and he reminded the student to apply right rudder and right aileron. He added that it seemed like the student applied too much right aileron, and the right wing was close to dragging on the runway. The flight instructor prepared to take the flight controls, and the student overcorrected to the left and the left wing impacted the ground. The flight instructor took control of the airplane, reduced power, and taxied to park without further incident.
The student pilot reported that, during a soft-field takeoff, about 30 to 35 knots, the airplane lifted off the ground and encountered a crosswind that rolled the airplane to the right. The right wing dragged on the ground, he rolled the airplane to the left, and the left wing then impacted the ground.
The airplane sustained substantial damage to the left aileron.
The school's chief flight instructor reported that there were no preaccident mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation.
Probable cause
The student pilot’s failure to maintain lateral control during a soft-field takeoff.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record GAA18CA282
- Event ID
- 20180517X95944
- Case number
- GAA18CA282
- 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: d8f35be5cf460de8e360fdd40b5743c3695fe65fa73f3c662531df4535de98d8; retrieved 2026-09-16T07:10:55.994Z.