NTSB CAROL · Event
Event ERA21LA167
Aircraft involved
Probable cause & findings
The pilot’s improper decision to attempt a takeoff with a quartering tailwind and his failure to reject the takeoff in a timely manner, which resulted in a runway excursion.
Factual narrative
The pilot reported that he was taking off from his private airstrip with a left quartering tailwind for an aerial application flight. Due to payload and wind conditions, flying airspeed was not attained prior to his anticipated liftoff point. The nose of the airplane began to veer to the left, and he attempted to correct the drift. He passed his decision point and attempted to avoid a ditch in his path. The airplane impacted the northern bank of the ditch, shearing off the landing gear and damaging the propeller and spray system. After the airplane came to rest, the pilot egressed and a postaccident fire destroyed the wreckage. The pilot reported no preaccident mechanical failures or malfunctions 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).
- — Aircraft-Aircraft oper/perf/capability-Performance/control parameters-Airspeed-Not attained/maintained
- — Personnel issues-Action/decision-Info processing/decision-Decision making/judgment-Pilot
- — Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Wind-Tailwind-Contributed to outcome
- — Personnel issues-Action/decision-Action-Lack of action-Pilot
Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file
NTSB_2021_ERA21LA167.txt.
Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb.
Full investigation docket on
data.ntsb.gov ↗.
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Related research
What the literature says.
Academic papers and agency reports matching this event's aircraft type or causal vocabulary (runway excursion). Sourced from NASA NTRS, NTSB Safety Studies, FAA CAMI, AOPA Air Safety Institute, Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons, arXiv, and the Semantic Scholar academic graph.
- SKYbrary (Eurocontrol) 2024 · SKYbrary article
Runway Excursion — SKYbrary Knowledge Base
SKYbrary runway excursion review — RE-OE (overruns) + RE-LO (lateral). Risk drivers: long landing, high approach speed, contaminated surface, tailwind, mis-set autobrakes.
- NTSB Aircraft Accident Reports 2019 · Accident report
Embraer ERJ 175 Runway Excursion at Charlotte Douglas
Republic Airline ERJ-175 runway excursion CLT, January 2018. Examines a low-energy runway excursion involving misuse of autobrakes + thrust reverser response after a high-crosswind landing on a contam…
- NASA NTRS 2025 · Presentation
Uncovering Resilient Behavior in the Aviation Safety Reporting System Using Large Language Models
Resiliency is present in everyday life, both in system design and exhibited by the operators that function within these systems.
- NASA NTRS 2025 · Conference Paper
Uncovering Resilient Behavior in the Aviation Safety Reporting System Using Large Language Models
Resiliency is present in everyday life, both in system design and exhibited by the operators that function within these systems.
- Flight Safety Foundation 2024 · FSF / AeroSafety World
Runway Safety Initiative Final Report (RSI)
Foundation Runway Safety Initiative final report — comprehensive analysis of runway excursion + incursion risk drivers worldwide.
- Semantic Scholar 2020 · Article
Towards online prediction of safety-critical landing metrics in aviation using supervised machine learning
Abstract In recent years, due to the increased availability of data and improvements in computing power, application of machine learning techniques to various aviation safety problems for identifying,…
Browse the full corpus — academia portal ↗