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ERA23LA207

2023-04-15 · Wake Forest, North Carolina, United States · Minor · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed

Airport 7NC5

Current FAA registration · N33873

Make / Model
SCHWEIZER SGS 1-26E
Year of manufacture
1974 · 49 years old at event
Engine
NONE NONE
Seats / Engines
1 seats · 1 engine
Last airworthiness date
19741008
ADS-B equipped
Yes — Mode-S A3B6F0

Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

The student pilot’s failure to maintain airspeed during the landing approach, which resulted in an exceedance of the glider’s critical angle of attack, an aerodynamic stall, and a loss of control.

Factual narrative

According to the student pilot of the glider, another glider was still on the runway as he was entering the downwind leg of the airport traffic pattern for landing. He decided to land short of the turf runway and entered the glider into a forward slip in order to touch down in the intended area. He reported that, upon removing the slip, he noted that the airspeed decayed “from 60 to 30,” and about 40 to 45 ft above the ground, he realized that the glider was “stalled” and that he “had no control over the aircraft.” The glider impacted a parked tow airplane and terrain, resulting in substantial damage to the leading edge of the left wing and the aft fuselage. The student pilot reported no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures with the glider that would have precluded normal operation. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database Retrieved: 2026-02-12

NTSB Findings

FAA avdata. C = Cause, F = Factor.

  • — Aircraft-Aircraft oper/perf/capability-Performance/control parameters-Angle of attack-Not attained/maintained
  • — Personnel issues-Task performance-Use of equip/info-Aircraft control-Pilot

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_2023_ERA23LA207.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Search this event elsewhere

External sources are reported, not agency: signal that something happened, not fact about what happened.

Related research

Matched on aircraft type or causal vocabulary (stall, loss of control). All research papers