Smith AEROSTAR601 N90339

Summary

On 25 September 2018 at about 17:00 local time, a Smith AEROSTAR601 registered N90339 was involved in an accident near Heber, Utah, United States. One person was on board and nobody was injured. The aircraft was substantially damaged. The NTSB has published a probable cause for this accident; it is quoted in full below.

Date

25 September 2018 at 17:00

Classification

Accident

Location

Heber, Utah, United States

Nearest airport

Heber City Municipal Airport (HCR)

Coordinates

40.4828, -111.4261

Aircraft

Smith AEROSTAR601

Registration

N90339

Category

Airplane

Year built

1975

Engines

2

Operator

Not recorded

Operating rule

Part 91: General Aviation

Purpose of flight

Personal

Phase of flight

Not recorded

Route

Brigham City → Heber

Aircraft damage

Substantial

Weather

VMC

Light

Day

NTSB number

WPR18LA272

Nobody was injured.

A recent hard landing resulted in a fracture of a joint from a cylinder to a main landing gear.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record. This site does not paraphrase or interpret it.

Read the full NTSB narrative

The pilot stated he touched down normally and during the landing roll, the airplane veered left coming to rest off the runway surface. The airplane sustained substantial damage to the right wing and horizontal stabilizer. Postaccident examination of the landing gear assembly revealed that the weld had failed on the joint attached to the main landing gear cylinder and upper scissor assembly. Most of the fracture surface of the failure surface had been obliterated by smearing and grinding, consistent with post-fracture damage. The degree of the fracture surface damage was consistent with the fracture and separation happening before the accident. Landing gear components are under cyclic loads at every landing and during landing actions (such as braking or taxiing). There was no evidence of fatigue, corrosion, or other progressive mechanisms would have led to the fracture of this joint from the strut cylinder. It is likely that a recent hard landing fractured the joint from the cylinder, but it could not be determined whether this occurred during the accident landing or beforehand due to the damage incurred after the gear collapsed.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record.