ERA20LA145 · Schempp Hirth STANDARD CIRRUS Undesignat
Schempp Hirth STANDARD CIRRUS Undesignat · Accident: aerodynamic stall/spin while maneuvering
From Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0) to Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA20LA145
- 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
- 1 · 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
Schempp Hirth STANDARD CIRRUS Undesignat
- Aircraft type
- Schempp Hirth STANDARD CIRRUS
- Category
- Glider
- 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
- N271BL
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0), Groveland, FLTo Seminole Lake Gliderport (6FL0), Groveland, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 48 years (built 1972)
- 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
- Aerodynamic stall/spin
- 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
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, not marked as estimated; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the tow pilot, while climbing through about 500 ft above the ground during takeoff, they encountered an area of turbulence and the glider got “low on the tow” and out of view in his mirror. He then felt the glider release from the tow. Witnesses stated that the glider released from the tow at "low" altitude and turned back toward the gliderport when the nose of the glider pointed “down," and the glider descended vertically from view. Examination of the wreckage confirmed continuity to all flight control surfaces and revealed no preimpact mechanical anomalies. Review of the pilot’s logbook revealed a total of 49 flights. Of those flights, 44 were performed in two-seat gliders. The pilot had recorded five flights in the accident glider, all of which included an aerotow to a release altitude of either 2,500 or 3,000 ft agl. There was no evidence to indicate that the pilot had performed any simulated takeoff emergencies in the accident glider make and model. A number of different mechanical, operational, and environmental factors can result in an early termination of a tow; however, the reason the pilot terminated the tow could not be determined based on available evidence. Witness descriptions of the glider’s flight after release are consistent with the pilot exceeding the critical angle of attack while maneuvering toward the runway, which resulted in an aerodynamic stall.
Probable cause
The pilot’s exceedance of the glider’s critical angle of attack following his premature termination of the tow for reasons that could not be determined, which resulted in an aerodynamic stall/spin during a turn back to the departure airport.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA20LA145
- Event ID
- 20200408X72656
- Case number
- ERA20LA145
- 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, cause areas. 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: 59ed4c5122351a97d6612853a81a2cdda857c966f56b1f6350e794251a51d86e; retrieved 2026-09-15T07:13:26.594Z.