CEN22LA091 · Piper PA-28-235
Piper PA-28-235 · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN22LA091
- 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
- 0
- 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
Piper PA-28-235
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N8591W
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 58 years (built 1963)
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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 › Action/decision
- 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 non-certificated pilot and 5 passengers intended to complete a personal flight. After takeoff, the airplane impacted the ground about 600 yards from the end of the runway. The airplane came to rest upright about 50 yards from the initial impact point. The pilot fled the scene and was not available during the investigation. The passengers were transported to medical facilities for treatment and did not provide any information for the investigation. Postaccident examination of the airplane revealed signs that the engine was producing power at the time of impact. There was no evidence of fuel in any of the fuel tanks or on the ground near the airplane, but one fuel tank was breached at the leading edge during the accident sequence. The examination did not reveal any preaccident mechanical malfunctions or anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. Local law enforcement stated that the total weight of the occupants was about 1,153 lbs. A fuel receipt showed that the airplane had been fueled with 42.23 gallons of fuel about 2 hours before the accident flight, at another airport about 142 nautical miles (nm) away. Due to the damage to the airplane, the investigation was unable to determine the amount of fuel onboard at the time of the accident. The estimated takeoff weight of the airplane was between 2,642 lbs and 2,775 lbs, and the maximum gross weight of the airplane was 2,900 lbs. The estimated center of gravity was between +93.89 and +93.94 inches aft of datum, which was aft of the allowable limit of +93.5 inches aft of datum. It is likely that the pilot did not complete a preflight weight and balance calculation, which would have determined that the center of gravity would have been aft of the allowable limits. The aft center of gravity would have reduced the longitudinal stability during the climb out.
Probable cause
The non-certificated pilot’s failure to perform a preflight weight and balance calculation and his decision to operate the airplane beyond the allowable center of gravity limitations, which resulted in a loss of control and impact with terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN22LA091
- Event ID
- 20220104104485
- Case number
- CEN22LA091
- 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: 2e7d98f99bca37fb610e5ccb397d2aff130bc7079ff0d46891baf43eb9288956; retrieved 2026-09-16T14:52:04.127Z.