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Atlas / NTSB / WPR11CA259

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event WPR11CA259

2011-06-08 Palo Alto, California, United States Airport · KPAO None 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Registry · N9849L

FAA Aircraft Registry record.

Make / Model

CESSNA 172P

Year of manufacture

1986 · 25 years old at event

Engine

LYCOMING 0-320 SERIES (180 hp)

Seats / Engines

4 seats · 1 engine

Last airworthiness date

19860616

ADS-B equipped

Yes — Mode-S ADBD9E

Registrant of record

DYNASTY ADVENTURE INC

Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

The pilot's failure to maintain directional control during the landing roll.

Factual narrative

The pilot reported that during his descent to land, he observed the windsock and made a mental note to maintain aileron correction for the crosswind. As the airplane reached about 35-40 feet above the runway, the pilot reduced power to idle and at about 2 ft he initiated the landing flare. The stall warning horn sounded and the nose of the airplane started to veer to the left. After the airplane touched down, the pilot applied right rudder and the airplane started to veer off to the right. The airplane exited the right side of the runway and struck a pipe that was protruding from the ground, substantially damaging the nose gear and firewall. The pilot reported no mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airframe or engine that would have precluded normal flight. The pilot reported that during his descent to land, he observed the windsock and made a mental note to maintain aileron correction for the crosswind. As the airplane reached about 35-40 feet above the runway, the pilot reduced power to idle and at an altitude of 2 feet he initiated the landing flare. The stall warning horn sounded and the nose of the airplane started to veer to the left. After the airplane touched down, the pilot applied right rudder and the airplane started to veer off to the right. The airplane exited the right side of the runway and struck a pipe that was protruding from the ground, substantially damaging the nose gear and firewall. The pilot reported no mechanical failures or malfunctions with the airframe or engine that would have precluded normal flight. 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).

  • Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Wind-Crosswind-Response/compensation
  • 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_2011_WPR11CA259.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 ↗