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Atlas / NTSB / GAA19CA577

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event GAA19CA577

2019-09-28 Morrisville, Vermont, United States Airport · MVL None 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Registry · N5310S

FAA Aircraft Registry record.

Make / Model

AEROTEK INC PITTS S-2B

Year of manufacture

1984 · 35 years old at event

Engine

LYCOMING AEIO-540 SER (260 hp)

Seats / Engines

2 seats · 1 engine

Last airworthiness date

19840628

ADS-B equipped

Yes — Mode-S A6B68D

Registrant of record

GORDON WILLIAM S III

Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

The pilot's failure to maintain directional control during landing, which resulted in a runway excursion and nose down.

Factual narrative

The biplane pilot reported that, during the landing roll, the biplane veered right. He applied left rudder and brakes, the left-wing tip scrapped the runway and the biplane exited the runway to the left. He then applied more brakes to avoid a drainage ditch and the biplane nosed down. The pilot reported that the biplane sustained substantial damage to the lower, left-wing spar. The pilot reported that there were no preaccident mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation. The pilot reported that, during the landing roll, the biplane veered right. He applied left rudder and brakes, the left wingtip scraped the runway, and the biplane exited the runway to the left. He then applied more brakes to avoid a drainage ditch, and the biplane nosed down. The biplane sustained substantial damage to the lower, left wing spar. The pilot reported that there were no preaccident mechanical failures or malfunctions with the biplane 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 Aircraft-Aircraft oper/perf/capability-Performance/control parameters-Directional control-Not attained/maintained - C
  • C Personnel issues-Task performance-Use of equip/info-Aircraft control-Pilot - C

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_2019_GAA19CA577.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 (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.

Browse the full corpus — academia portal ↗