SEA05CA135
2005-06-28 · Laurel, Montana, United States · None · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed
Airport 6S8
Current FAA registration · N2619D
- Make / Model
- CESSNA 170B
- Year of manufacture
- 1952 · 53 years old at event
- Engine
- LYCOMING O&VO-360 SER (180 hp)
- Seats / Engines
- 4 seats · 1 engine
- Last airworthiness date
- 19760604
- ADS-B equipped
- Yes — Mode-S A2864B
Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).
Aircraft involved
Probable cause & findings
The flight instructor's failure to maintain directional control during the landing roll, which resulted in an inadvertent ground loop. A contributing factor was the flight instructor's diverted attention to talking with the student.
Factual narrative
On June 28, 2005, approximately 0800 mountain daylight time, a Cessna 170B, N2619D, sustained substantial damage when it encountered terrain following a loss of control during the landing roll on runway 04 at the Laurel Municipal Airport, Laurel, Montana. The flight instructor and the private pilot rated student were not injured. The airplane was registered to and operated by the student. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed and no flight plan was filed for the local instructional flight conducted under 14 CFR Part 91. The flight departed from Laurel Municipal Airport about 0715. According to the flight instructor, the purpose of the flight was to work on landings. After the student completed two landings on runway 22, the instructor suggested they switch to runway 04 "as the wind sock was showing some movement from the east." The instructor then made two landings on runway 04. During the landing roll of the second landing, she was discussing the landing with the student and looked over at him. The airplane "veered to the right into the grass," and the addition of power did not stop the airplane from ground looping. The left wing and left elevator contacted the ground and sustained structural damage. According to the flight instructor, the purpose of the flight was to work on landings. After the student completed two landings on runway 22, the instructor suggested they switch to runway 04 "as the wind sock was showing some movement from the east." The instructor then made two landings on runway 04. During the landing roll of the second landing, she was discussing the landing with the student and looked over at him. The airplane "veered to the right into the grass," and the addition of power did not stop the airplane from ground looping. The left wing and left elevator contacted the ground and sustained structural damage. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12
Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file
NTSB_2005_SEA05CA135.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.