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Atlas / NTSB / LAX84LA061

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event LAX84LA061

1983-11-13 LUCERNE VALLEY, California, United States Serious 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Aircraft involved

Factual narrative

THE STUDENT PLT WAS ON HIS 1ST SOLO LAUNCH USING AN AUTO TOW & A NOSE HOOK. DURING THE LAUNCH, THE GLIDER BECAME AIRBORNE AT ABOUT 42 MPH. THEREAFTER, THE STUDENT CLIMBED SUCCESSFULLY TO AN ESTIMATED ALT OF APRX 200 FT. AT ABOUT THAT TIME, THE STUDENT'S INSTRUCTOR PLT (IP), WHO WAS DRIVING THE LAUNCH VEHICLE, OBSERVED SAND SAILERS AT HIS 10 TO 11 O'CLOCK POSITION. TO AVOID A CONFRONTATION & TO PROTECT THE SAND SAILERS FROM THE TOW LINE BEING DROPPED IN THEIR VICINITY, THE IP ALTERED HIS COURSE ABOUT 30 DEG TO THE RIGHT. THE TOW LINE BECAME SLACK & THE STUDENT THOUGHT THE LAUNCH VEHICLE WAS SLOWING (BUT IT WAS REPORTED ACCELERATING). THE STUDENT RELEASED THE TOW CABLE, THEN TURNED TO LAND ON THE DRY LAKE BED/STRIP. HOWEVER, THE GLIDER STALLED. THE STUDENT SAID THAT HE MADE AN INCOMPLETE RECOVERY PRIOR TO A VERY HARD LANDING & GROUND LOOP. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_1983_LAX84LA061.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 ↗