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Atlas / NTSB / WPR23LA254

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event WPR23LA254

2023-07-04 Belgrade, Montana, United States Airport · KBZN Minor 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Registry · N3171H

FAA Aircraft Registry record.

Make / Model

MAULE MX-7-180

Year of manufacture

2018 · 5 years old at event

Engine

LYCOMING O-360-C1F (180 hp)

Seats / Engines

5 seats · 1 engine

Last airworthiness date

20180407

ADS-B equipped

Yes — Mode-S A36355

Registrant of record

KH AIR LLC

Source: FAA Aircraft Registry (releasable master file).

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

The pilot’s failure to maintain directional control during landing with a quartering tailwind, which resulted in a runway excursion and nose over.

Factual narrative

The pilot of the tailwheel equipped airplane reported that during landing, the airplane’s tail swung to the right and the airplane veered to the left. The airplane struck a runway edge cone, then exited the turf runway and nosed over. The left wing, both wing struts, the vertical stabilizer, and the rudder were substantially damaged. The pilot said there was a 6-10 kt left quartering tailwind when he exited the airplane. He reported that there were no preaccident mechanical malfunctions or failures 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).

  • Aircraft-Aircraft oper/perf/capability-Performance/control parameters-Directional control-Not attained/maintained
  • Personnel issues-Task performance-Use of equip/info-Aircraft control-Pilot
  • Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Wind-Tailwind-Ability to respond/compensate

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_2023_WPR23LA254.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 ↗