Accidents

An explosion at SpaceX’s launch pad in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Thursday morning sparked a social media storm when the blast sent clouds of smoke billowing into the sky and shook buildings several miles away. The Falcon 9 rocket, set for liftoff this Saturday, and its payload were destroyed in the incident. SpaceX pad on fire!! […]

The largest aircraft in the world, Hybrid Air Vehicles Airlander 10, which first flew last week, made a hard landing on its second test flight. The helium-filled structure had flown for more than 1.5 hours before it made a very steep approach into Cardington Airfield in Bedfordshire, U.K. In what appeared to be slow motion, […]

While the GA community is certainly optimistic at hearing the 25th annual Nall Report’s announcement of a positive improvement in GA’s fatal fixed-wing accident rate, one positive year can’t quite be called an industry trend. Using 2013 data, GA’s fatal rate declined 19 percent, for the first time falling below 1.0, to 0.99 per 100,000 […]

It was a warm spring day at Flagstaff. The wind was down Runway 21 at 16 knots with gusts to 22. The density altitude at the airport, 7,000 feet above sea level, was 9,000 feet; but that would not be a problem for the lightly loaded A36 Bonanza that taxied away from the FBO a […]

A quest to create the world’s only flightworthy Bugatti 100P replica ended in tragedy on Saturday when builder Scotty Wilson was killed in a crash of the airplane shortly after takeoff from Clinton Sherman Airport in Burns Flat, Oklahoma. Video of the takeoff showed the airplane struggling to gain altitude before it turned sharply left […]

The pilot of a Glasair Sportsman GS-2 was temporarily blinded after his aircraft took a direct hit from a wedge-tailed eagle at 5,500 feet. Wedge-tailed eagles typically weigh between seven and eight pounds. The incident, reported by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB), serves as another reminder of the substantial damage and adverse effects to […]

Although landing excursions outnumber takeoff excursions by a margin of four-to-one, the FAA believes not enough attention is being paid by pilots to the dangers of the latter type of incident. Aiming to change that, the agency issued a Safety Alert for Operators (SAFO) that encourages the use of standard operating procedures to ensure accurate […]

Cessna T210K Boise, Idaho/Injuries: 1 Uninjured The pilot reported that he departed on a time-sensitive cargo flight with about 30 gallons of fuel in each tank. The flight was uneventful until the airplane was about 650 feet above ground level and about 2 miles from the destination airport when the engine experienced a total loss […]

The following is an excerpt from official NTSB summaries of general aviation accidents in the United States. NTSB investigators either traveled in support of this investigation or conducted a significant amount of investigative work without any travel, and used data obtained from various sources to prepare this aircraft accident report. Piper PA-32 Cuba, Missouri/Injuries: 1 […]

In August of last year, a 125-hour pilot rented a Piper Arrow in Palm Beach, Florida. The rental agreement the pilot signed included a proviso that “there are not to be any night flights to or from the Bahamas or Florida Keys before sunrise or after sunset.” Notwithstanding the advice of one’s parents, one may […]