FTW04LA178
2004-06-24 · San Antonio, Texas, United States · None · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed
Airport SSF
Current FAA registration · N810SA
- Make / Model
- CESSNA 172S
- Year of manufacture
- 2003 · 1 years old at event
- Engine
- LYCOMING IO-360-L2A (180 hp)
- Seats / Engines
- 4 seats · 1 engine
- Last airworthiness date
- 20030623
- ADS-B equipped
- Yes — Mode-S AB0AED
Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).
Aircraft involved
Probable cause & findings
The student pilot's failure to maintain control of the airplane during landing.
Factual narrative
On June 24, 2004, at 1335 central daylight time, a Cessna 172S single-engine airplane, N810SA, was substantially damaged following a loss of control while landing on runway 14 at Stinson Municipal Airport (SSF), near San Antonio, Texas. The student pilot, sole occupant of the airplane, was not injured. The airplane was registered to Black Hound LLC, of Seguin, Texas, and was being operated by Wright Flyers Aviation, Inc., of San Antonio, Texas. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed throughout the area for the 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 instructional flight. The local flight originated from the San Antonio International Airport (SAT), near San Antonio, Texas, approximately 1230. The 76-hour student pilot stated in the Pilot/Operator Aircraft Accident Report (NTSB Form 6120.1/2) that he departed SAT, flew to SSF, and completed 2 stop-and-go's on runway 14 (a 4,128 feet long and 100 feet wide asphalt runway). The student pilot took off a third time, in a left hand traffic pattern and lined up for a short-field landing, aiming for the "second stripe" of runway 14. As the pilot retracted the flaps after touching down, he "lost control of the airplane to the right" and applied light brakes, stating that he "didn't want to make any other movement to the rudder" because he was already in the grass to the right of the runway. The airplane impacted a taxiway sign and spun around. After the airplane came to a complete stop, the student pilot shut-down the engine and exited the airplane. Examination of the wreckage by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) inspector, who responded to the accident site, revealed structural damage to the right horizontal stabilizer and elevator, and damage to the right main landing gear attach point. At the time of the accident, the winds were reported as variable, at 3 knots. After a third take-off from runway 14, the 76-hour student pilot flew a left hand traffic pattern and lined up for a short-field landing, aiming for the "second stripe" of runway 14. As the pilot retracted the flaps after touching down, he "lost control of the airplane to the right." He applied light brakes, and "didn't want to make any other movement to the rudder" because he was already in the grass to the right of the runway. The airplane impacted a taxiway sign and spun around. At the time of the accident, the winds were reported as variable, at 3 knots. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12
Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file
NTSB_2004_FTW04LA178.txt.
Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb.
Full investigation docket on
data.ntsb.gov ↗.
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Related research
Matched on aircraft type or causal vocabulary (loss of control). All research papers
- Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons 2025 · Journal article (JAAER) A Scoping Review of Aviation Loss of Control Inflight Research
Loss of control – inflight (LOC-I) contributes to aircraft accidents at unacceptably high rates. Significant industry efforts and research have aimed to improve LOC-I prevention, detection, and recove…
- SKYbrary (Eurocontrol) 2024 · SKYbrary article Loss of Control In-Flight (LOC-I) — SKYbrary Knowledge Base
SKYbrary comprehensive knowledge-base entry on Loss of Control In-Flight — definitions, contributing factors, accident case studies (Air France 447, Colgan 3407), and prevention strategies.
- Semantic Scholar 2024 · Article (International Conference on Networking and Services) Risk Assessment of Loss of Control In-Flight Trajectories for Urban Air Mobility Safety
In Urban Air Mobility (UAM), maintaining a minimum separation between aircraft is a safety requirement, which becomes challenging amidst congested air traffic and off-nominal conditions, such as Loss …
- NTSB Aircraft Accident Reports 2022 · Accident report Loss of Control on Takeoff in Icing Conditions — Citation 560XL
Cessna Citation 560XL fatal takeoff icing accident, March 2018. Investigation of a Citation 560XL loss-of-control takeoff accident in icing conditions.
- Semantic Scholar 2021 · Article (Aviation) ANALYSIS OF GENERAL AVIATION FIXED-WING AIRCRAFT ACCIDENTS INVOLVING INFLIGHT LOSS OF CONTROL USING A STATE-BASED APPROACH
Inflight loss of control (LOC-I) is a significant cause of General Aviation (GA) fixed-wing aircraft accidents. The United States National Transportation Safety Board’s database provides a rich source…
- NASA NTRS 2021 · Presentation Use of Design of Experiments in Determining Neural Network Architectures for Loss of Control Detection
Abstract—We describe empirical methods for selecting a neural network architecture to implement belief state inference on generic commercial transport aircraft.