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Atlas / NTSB / LAX07CA139

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event LAX07CA139

2007-04-28 Grand Canyon, Arizona, United States Airport · GCN None 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

The pilot's misjudged landing flare, which resulted in a bounced landing and a porpoise.

Factual narrative

On April 28, 2007, at 1635 mountain standard time, the nose landing gear of a Cessna T206H, N1273E, sheared off following a bounced landing at the Grand Canyon National Park Airport, Grand Canyon, Arizona. Juliet-Echo LLC was operating the airplane under the provisions of 14 CFR Part 91. The private pilot and one passenger were not injured; the airplane sustained substantial damage. The cross-country personal flight departed Tucumcari, New Mexico, about 1420, with a planned destination of Grand Canyon. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed, and an instrument flight rules (IFR) flight plan had been filed. The approximate global positioning system (GPS) coordinates of the primary wreckage were 35 degrees 57.1 minutes north latitude and 112 degrees 8.8 minutes west longitude. The pilot stated in a written report that, after being cleared to land, he slowed the airplane, and began final descent to land. As he passed over the landing threshold, he reduced the power, and began to flare. As he was in the flare and the airplane was in a stall for landing, a momentary gust of wind caused the airplane to settle to the runway harder than he anticipated. The airplane bounced back into the air, the nose pitched up, and the left wing dropped. The pilot pushed forward on the yoke, and upon the second hard landing, the nose gear sheared off. The pilot stated that the airplane and engine had no mechanical failures or malfunctions during the flight. The nose landing gear sheared off following a bounced landing and porpoise pilot induced oscillation. The pilot stated in a written report that as he passed over the landing threshold, he reduced the power, and began to flare. As he was in the flare, a momentary gust of wind caused the airplane to settle to the runway harder than he anticipated. The airplane bounced back into the air, the nose pitched up, and the left wing dropped. The pilot pushed forward on the yoke and upon the second hard landing, the nose gear sheared off. The pilot stated that the airplane and engine had no mechanical failures or malfunctions during the flight. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_2007_LAX07CA139.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 (stall). 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 ↗