ERA24LA357 · Cessna 172 C
Cessna 172 C · Accident: loss of control on ground during takeoff
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA24LA357
- 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
Cessna 172 C
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N8400X
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 63 years (built 1961)
- 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 systems
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot completed two successful takeoffs and landings in the airport traffic pattern and was taking off for a third time when the accident occurred. After the pilot applied takeoff power and the airplane had accelerated forward for less than 75 feet before the pilot’s seat slid back to the aftmost position. The pilot let go of the control yoke to prevent the airplane from pitching upward, but as the airplane continued to accelerate, he was unable to reach the rudder pedals and brakes. The pilot was eventually able to reach the throttle and reduced it to the idle position. The airplane subsequently departed the left side of the runway and came to rest in a ditch, resulting in substantial damage to the horizontal stabilizer and elevator.
Postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that the pilot’s seat was not correctly installed and that the front left seat rail guide was not engaged with the rail. This resulted in the seat being position too high and prevented complete engagement of the seat adjustment rod. When the seat was adjusted, its position would lock, but when sufficient aft force was applied to the back of the seat, the adjustment rod would disengage and allow the seat to move. The pilot stated that he previously removed and reinstalled the seat to perform preventative maintenance.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to correctly reinstall the airplane’s left seat, resulting in the movement of the seat during the takeoff roll, and the subsequent loss of control and runway excursion.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA24LA357
- Event ID
- 20240823194986
- Case number
- ERA24LA357
- 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, 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: 409b9ee607d795c3d307deba2b6263219a3e9cdba0d171b3b2127e50604299ba; retrieved 2026-09-16T19:12:03.645Z.