How a Little Frost Seriously Impacted a Flight

Combination of factors—contamination, ground effect, and upward acceleration—all pushed toward a stall.

Peter Garrison

Friday, August 29, 2025 at 09:00 AM ET

Verified

Edited By:

Travis Tingle

An Embraer EMB-500 Phenom 100 taxis at London Southend Airport, which is covered in snow during blizzard. [Alamy]

Key Takeaways:

The Embraer Phenom 300 crash in Provo, which killed the pilot, was officially attributed by the NTSB to a premature wing stall caused by ice contamination, possibly due to the pilot inadvertently turning off the deice system.
A significant, often overlooked factor contributing to the accident was ground effect, which can reduce a wing's maximum lift and lower the stall angle of attack when an aircraft is close to the ground.
The accident was likely a complex interaction of potential upper-surface wing contamination, the subtle aerodynamic influences of ground effect, and possibly an overly aggressive pitch angle during takeoff rotation.

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On a January morning at Provo, Utah, an Embraer Phenom 300 was towed out of its heated hangar onto a ramp whitened by falling snow. It was fueled, and the pilot and three passengers boarded.

It taxied to the runway and, some 40 minutes after it had emerged from the hangar, the Phenom began its takeoff roll. It rotated, began to climb, then rolled to the left. The wing struck the runway, pulling the airplane sideways. The fuselage came to rest largely intact, only its left front portion crushed. There was no fire. All of the passengers survived the crash—only the pilot died.