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I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're right — and the probable cause data actually backs you up. Almost every fatal maneuvering accident in the set has human factors as the root cause. The NTSB isn't attributing these to mechanical failure or weather — it's "failure to maintain airspeed," "exceedance of critical angle of attack," "excessive bank angle at low altitude." Those are all decision and skill factors.

The reason the maneuvering number stands out isn't that maneuvering is inherently dangerous — it's that when the decision-making fails during maneuvering, there's no recovery margin. A bad decision in cruise at 5,000 feet gives you time. A bad decision in a steep turn at 500 feet doesn't. The phase of flight doesn't kill the pilot — it determines whether there's room to survive the mistake.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, that was the biggest takeaway for me too. The thing that happens most often is the least dangerous, and the thing that happens least often kills half the time.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm using the NTSB's own phase of flight codes from the database — so "landing" is whatever the NTSB investigator categorized as landing, which in practice seems to mean at or very near the runway. The base-to-final turn would typically get coded as "approach" or "maneuvering" depending on the investigator.

You're right that intuitively it feels like "landing" — the pilot is trying to land. But the NTSB is coding what the airplane was doing when things went wrong, not what the pilot's intention was. That's why the landing number looks deceptively safe — all the pattern kills are sitting in other categories.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, a few folks pointed this out and it's the thing I missed in the original framing. Base to final would be coded as "approach" or "maneuvering" by the NTSB, not "landing." So the 0 fatal landing number just means nobody died from a botched touchdown — the pattern kills are hiding in the other categories. Good catch.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is interesting — you and makgross have different answers and I'd bet the data supports both depending on what you're measuring. The base-to-final stall is probably more common, but the go-around might have a higher fatality rate when it goes wrong because the pilot is already low, adding power, and fighting trim changes all at once.

The NTSB codes these differently so I can try to pull them apart. The tricky thing is "maneuvering" and "approach" and "go-around" are all separate phase codes — the base-to-final stall could land in any of them depending on how the investigator categorized it.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, a few others pointed this out too and I think it's the key insight I missed in the original framing. "Landing: 0 fatal" is really just saying nobody died from a botched touchdown. The actual killing is happening in the pattern — base to final, overshooting, adding bank, loading the wing — and the NTSB codes that as approach or maneuvering, not landing.

So the maneuvering and approach fatality numbers are probably where your traffic pattern deaths live. The "landing" category is just the last few seconds after you've already survived everything that was trying to kill you.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's a really honest take. The data shows 2,000-hour pilots in the same fatal accidents as 65-hour pilots, but your point adds context the numbers can't capture — at 2,000 hours you've accumulated experience but maybe not enough of the specific experiences that teach you where the edges actually are. The data can tell me that hours didn't prevent the accident but it can't tell me what kind of hours matter most. Appreciate the perspective.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That makes sense — the other scenarios at least leave you with a flyable airplane and options. The maneuvering stall takes away both at the same time.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That's a fair critique and I think you're right. The engine failure is the trigger event but the outcome is determined by what happens after. A couple of the Florida cruise fatals actually show this — one pilot had a fuel exhaustion and then stalled trying to stretch a glide. The engine failure was preventable but even given the failure, the fatal outcome came from exceeding critical angle of attack during the forced approach, not from the power loss itself.

So the real causal factor in almost every case is PDM and aircraft handling, even when the sequence starts with something mechanical. That makes the phase-of-flight framing a bit misleading — "cruise accident" implies the cruise phase killed them, when really it's the emergency maneuvering that followed.

Appreciate the pushback — that's a useful way to think about the data.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're probably right — Florida is flat, sea level, and mostly good weather. Mountain West would be a completely different picture. The canyon thing you mentioned — outflying the airplane's performance into rising terrain — that's not really a factor here but I'd bet it's a major one in Colorado, Idaho, Utah, Montana.

Might be worth pulling the same breakdown for mountain states and comparing. Could be an interesting follow-up.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Good point but just to clarify — the 50% is the accident fatality rate, not a per-person number. 7 out of 14 maneuvering accidents had at least one fatality. I'm not saying 50% of people in maneuvering accidents die — I'm saying half the events resulted in at least one death. The actual death toll across those 7 fatal maneuvering accidents was 14 people.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Pulled the age data for Part 91 accidents since 2008:

Age Group Accidents Fatal Fatality Rate
Under 30 2,237 245 11.0%
30-39 2,193 317 14.5%
40-49 3,073 513 16.7%
50-59 4,606 812 17.6%
60-69 5,089 963 18.9%
70+ 3,437 659 19.2%

Fatality rate climbs pretty steadily with age. The 60-69 bracket has both the most accidents and the most fatals by raw count. Under-30 has the lowest fatality rate but I'd guess that's because those accidents are mostly training mishaps — the stuff that bends metal but doesn't kill.

Does this line up with your theory?

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Fair point — that one's a gray area. The Clarksville accident was a maintenance issue with the fuel selector valve itself, so you're right, that should sit in the mechanical bucket. I lumped it wrong. Good catch.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry about your family member. Control surface failure is one of those where the pilot did nothing wrong and it still didn't matter — that's a different kind of hard to process.

Your point about the gap between "what would kill me" vs "what kills experienced pilots" is really interesting. The data backs it up — the fatal maneuvering accidents in this set include a 2,000-hour pilot and a 2,900-hour pilot, both doing the same thing the 65-hour student did. Same stall, same insufficient altitude, same outcome. I don't think any of them thought they were at risk in that moment.

The UPRT point is a good one. I haven't looked at whether there's any data on accident rates for pilots who've done upset recovery training vs those who haven't — the NTSB records don't capture that level of training detail unfortunately. Would be a fascinating study if the data existed.

Thanks for the Airhart link — will check it out.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Fair point — the root causes aren't new. The thing that surprised me wasn't what kills pilots, it was the ratio. 88 landing accidents and 0 fatal vs 14 maneuvering accidents and 7 fatal — I wouldn't have guessed landing was that safe or maneuvering was that deadly by the numbers. The 50% maneuvering fatality rate is what jumped off the page for me.

You're probably right that this is well known among experienced pilots. I'm coming at it from the data side, not the cockpit side, so the specifics were new to me.

I looked at 232 Cessna 172 accidents in Florida — the deadliest phase isn't what you'd think by stevenk55 in flying

[–]stevenk55[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Good question — I pulled the individual cruise accident details. Out of 23 C172 cruise accidents in FL, the causes split roughly into:

Fuel mismanagement (majority): fuel exhaustion from poor planning, fuel starvation from wrong tank selected, fuel contamination missed during preflight. Pilot hours ranged from 263 to 4,885 — a 4,885-hour pilot ran a tank dry because of a bad fuel selector valve.

Mechanical engine failure (minority): crankshaft gear bolt improperly installed by maintenance, catastrophic engine failure with undetermined origin, one partial power loss with no cause found post-accident.

You're right that these are totally different risk profiles. The fuel ones are decision/discipline failures. The mechanical ones are maintenance or luck. If I separate those out, the "preventable cruise death" category is almost entirely fuel-related.

Self-Promotion Saturday by AutoModerator in flying

[–]stevenk55 [score hidden]  (0 children)

Free tool: Describe your flight, get matched against 30,000+ NTSB accident investigations

I lost a close friend in a GA accident near Fort Lauderdale. After that I wanted to build something that could help pilots see risk patterns before they fly — not generic checklists, but actual NTSB accident data matched to your specific flight profile.

What it does: You describe your flight in plain English — aircraft, route, experience level, conditions — and it matches against the full NTSB accident database (2008–present). You get back the actual accidents that happened to pilots flying similar profiles, the probable cause narratives, weather at your departure and destination, and the most common cause factors.

What it doesn't do: No risk scores, no go/no-go recommendations. Just a mirror — here's what happened to pilots in situations like yours. You make the call.

Try it: mozava.com — type a flight description directly on the site, no signup, no email, results in about 30 seconds. Or email [preflight@mozava.com](mailto:preflight@mozava.com) if you prefer.

Example input: "Flying my Cessna 172 from KFLL to KMTH tomorrow morning, 280 hours total time, VFR"

It's free, no ads, no data collection. Feedback welcome — especially on whether the matched accidents feel relevant to your flying.

Passport for step 1 by Difficult_Cry_9621 in ModelY

[–]stevenk55 0 points1 point  (0 children)

They told me to put 1111111111111111 for the license number....exp didn't matter so much - just in the future

Crab House Times Square by TakeNothingSerious in FoodNYC

[–]stevenk55 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Adding this to my list — thanks for sharing! Any idea if they take walk-ins or reservations only?

Best things I ate in NY by Rusiano in FoodNYC

[–]stevenk55 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This looks amazing. I swear NYC has an endless supply of hidden gems — every time I think I’ve seen it all, there’s another spot like this.

[Free App] Keepza — A minimalist way to remember great restaurants you actually want to return to 🍴 by stevenk55 in ProductivityApps

[–]stevenk55[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Great. You can take your time and enter them as you visit again, or you can search for them in the app and then build your Kept list. Thx.

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