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Atlas / NTSB / CEN12CA233

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event CEN12CA233

2012-04-07 Marienthal, Kansas, United States None 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

The pilot's inadequate compensation for the wind during landing.

Factual narrative

The pilot reported that there was a crosswind which was aggravated by a line of trees along the side of the runway, making the air turbulent. On the landing approach, he encountered turbulence or a downdraft, resulting in the airplane landing hard on its nose gear. The nose gear broke off and the airplane nosed over on its back resulting in substantial damage. The pilot reported no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures with the airplane that would have precluded normal operations. The pilot reported that there was a crosswind that was aggravated by a line of trees along the side of the runway, making the air turbulent. On the landing approach, the airplane encountered turbulence or a downdraft, which resulted in the airplane landing hard on its nose gear. The nose gear separated and the airplane nosed over on its back, which resulted in substantial damage. The pilot reported no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database Retrieved: 2026-02-12

NTSB Findings

Hierarchical cause / factor breakdown from the FAA bulk avdata database. Each finding tagged C (Cause) or F (Factor).

  • C Personnel issues-Action/decision-Action-Incorrect action performance-Pilot - C
  • Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Wind-Downdraft-Effect on operation
  • Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Wind-Crosswind-Effect on operation
  • Environmental issues-Physical environment-Object/animal/substance-Tree(s)-Contributed to outcome

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_2012_CEN12CA233.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Related research

What the literature says.

Academic papers and agency reports matching this event's aircraft type or causal vocabulary (turbulence). Sourced from NASA NTRS, NTSB Safety Studies, FAA CAMI, AOPA Air Safety Institute, Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons, arXiv, and the Semantic Scholar academic graph.

Browse the full corpus — academia portal ↗