GAA16CA134
2016-02-17 · Newport News, Virginia, United States · None · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed
Airport PHF
Current FAA registration · N35502
- Make / Model
- CESSNA 172S
- Seats / Engines
- 4 seats · 1 engine
- ADS-B equipped
- Yes — Mode-S A3F9D3
Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).
Aircraft involved
Probable cause & findings
The student pilot's failure to maintain directional control during the landing roll, resulting in a runway excursion and impact with terrain.
Factual narrative
According to the student pilot, he was performing his third stop and go landing, during his first solo flight. He reported that during the landing flare he heard the stall warning horn, and he bounced the landing while traveling at a ground speed of approximately 45 knots. The student pilot remarked that he was not able to control the airplanes lateral direction during the landing roll and the airplane exited the right side of the runway subsequently impacting a drainage culvert. The airplane sustained substantial damage to right wing and the fire wall. The pilot reported that there were no mechanical failures or anomalies with the airplane prior to, or during the flight that would have prevented normal flight operation. According to the student pilot, he was performing his third stop and go landing, during his first solo flight. He reported that during the landing flare he heard the stall warning horn, and he bounced the landing while traveling at a ground speed of approximately 45 knots. The student pilot remarked that he was not able to control the airplanes lateral direction during the landing roll and the airplane exited the right side of the runway subsequently impacting a drainage culvert. The airplane sustained substantial damage to right wing and the fire wall. The pilot reported that there were no mechanical failures or anomalies with the airplane prior to, or during the flight that would have prevented normal flight operation. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database Retrieved: 2026-02-12
NTSB Findings
FAA avdata. C = Cause, F = Factor.
- C Personnel issues-Task performance-Use of equip/info-Aircraft control-Pilot - C
- C Aircraft-Aircraft oper/perf/capability-Performance/control parameters-Directional control-Not attained/maintained - C
- — Aircraft-Aircraft oper/perf/capability-Performance/control parameters-Pitch control-Not attained/maintained
Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file
NTSB_2016_GAA16CA134.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.
- TallyAero Live Wire Aviation press
- NTSB CAROL Agency ↗
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Related research
Matched on aircraft type or causal vocabulary (stall, runway excursion). All research papers
- NASA NTRS 2023 · Reprint (Version printed in journal) Finite Element Simulation of Three Full-Scale Crash Tests for Cessna 172 Aircraft
The NASA Emergency Locator Transmitter Survivability and Reliability project was initiated in 2013 to assess the crash performance standards for the next generation of emergency locator transmitter (E…
- NASA NTRS 2019 · Conference Paper Crash Testing and Simulation of a Cessna 172 Aircraft: Pitch Down Impact Onto Soft Soil
During the summer of 2015, NASA Langley Research Center conducted three full-scale crash tests of Cessna 172 (C-172) aircraft at the NASA Langley Landing and Impact Research (LandIR) Facility.
- NASA NTRS 2019 · Technical Memorandum (TM) Simulating the Impact Response of Three Full-Scale Crash Tests of Cessna 172 Aircraft
During the summer of 2015, a series of three full-scale crash tests were performed at the Landing and Impact Research Facility located at NASA Langley Research Center of Cessna 172 aircraft.
- NASA NTRS 2026 · Conference Paper Computational Analysis of Steady State Aerodynamics of Transonic Truss-Braced Wing Configuration in Deep Stall
This study presents a computational investigation of steady state aerodynamics of the Subsonic Ultra-Green Aircraft Research (SUGAR) Transonic Truss-Braced Wing (TTBW) configuration over a wide range …
- 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.
- arXiv 2023 · arXiv preprint Automating Bird Diverter Installation through Multi-Aerial Robots and Signal Temporal Logic Specifications
This paper tackles the task assignment and trajectory generation problem for bird diverter installation using a fleet of multi-rotors.