Piper J3 N88204 accident near Hartford, Wisconsin

Probable cause

The pilot’s loss of situation awareness which resulted in landing in a grass area and the subsequent collision with a runway marker.

NTSB analysis

The pilot planned a personal flight to a nearby airport that had recently added new runways. Before the flight, his flight instructor sent him an airport diagram with the new grass runway marked, which was parallel to an asphalt runway. After the pilot reviewed the diagram, he thought he knew where to expect the new grass runway.

While in the traffic pattern at the destination airport, the pilot noticed a large open grass space below him, so he landed the airplane. The pilot landed to the east but thought he had landed to the west. The area that he landed on was not the grass runway; while completing a fast taxi, the airplane collided with a runway marker for the north-south runway. The airplane sustained substantial damage to the fuselage and left wing spar.

Text from the NTSB. Open the NTSB docket for CEN20LA436 for the full record.