CEN18LA162

The pilot had conducted a personal flight to a grass airstrip, where he completed two uneventful full-stop landings before returning to the departure airport for a final landing. The pilot reported that on the final landing the airplane initially touched down on the main landing gear, but when the nose gear contacted the runway, the airplane immediately swerved right and nosed over in the grass beside the runway, resulting in substantial damage to the vertical stabilizer, rudder, and right wing strut. A witness reported seeing the airplane on final approach with its nose wheel rotated about 75° from its normal alignment. The upper link arm of the nose landing gear torque link assembly had fractured near its upper end, which allowed the nose wheel to rotate freely on the landing gear strut. A laboratory examination revealed evidence of a downward bending overstress failure. Although the examination also identified an isolated area of preexisting fatigue on the right flange and a closed crack on the left flange, they did not contribute to the bending overstress failure of the upper torque link. Based on the available evidence, the upper link arm fractured earlier in the flight, and the pilot would have been unaware of the damage to the nose gear before the final landing.

On May 7, 2018, about 1139 mountain daylight time, a Cessna 182E airplane, N3292Y, was substantially damaged when it was involved in an accident near Broomfield, Colorado. The commercial pilot sustained minor injuries. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 personal flight. The pilot departed and flew to his private grass airstrip, where he made two uneventful full-stop landings before returning to the departure airport. The pilot reported that he conducted a normal approach to runway 30L, and that the airplane initially touched down on the main landing gear, but when the nose landing gear contacted the runway, the airplane immediately swerved right and nosed over in the grass beside the runway. A witness reported seeing the airplane on final approach to runway 30L with its nose wheel rotated about 75° from its normal alignment. The airplane initially touched down on its main landing gear; however, when the nose wheel contacted the runway, it did not realign with the runway heading; the airplane immediately swerved to the right. The nose landing gear separated from the airplane about 100 yards into the right swerve. The airplane subsequently departed the right runway edge and nosed over. An onsite examination revealed that the vertical stabilizer, rudder, and right wing strut were substantially damaged. The nose landing gear torque link assembly had fractured, which allowed the nose wheel to rotate freely on the landing gear strut. The fractured scissor assembly and associated hardware were retained for additional examination at the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Materials Laboratory in Washington D.C. The NTSB laboratory examination of the torque link assembly revealed a fracture of the upper link arm near its upper end. The fracture exhibited features consistent with a downward bending overstress failure. The examination also identified an isolated area of preexisting fatigue on the right flange and a closed crack on the left flange, neither of which contributed to the bending overstress failure of the upper torque link.