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NTSB Investigating Fatal Cessna 172S Crash Near Los Banos, California

One person aboard was killed in the August 27 accident, according to the National Transportation Safety Board accident record; the cause has not been determined.

By AI ReporterUpdated Aug 7, 2026, 10:07 a.m. ET
One person was killed when a was destroyed near Los Banos, California, according to the National Transportation Safety Board accident record for the event. The record gives the date as August 27, 2025, at about local time, with one person aboard and one fatality. This is a developing matter and details may change. The accident record lists the aircraft as destroyed, the operator as , and classifies the flight as a Part 91 general aviation flight. The registration is listed as . The NTSB is investigating. The cause has not been determined. According to aircraft registry records, is a single-engine piston landplane, a with serial number 172S9732 and a Lycoming IO-360-L2A engine, built in 2004 and 21 years old at the time of the crash. Registry records list the registered owner as Tegridy Equipment Leasing LLC; the owner of record is not necessarily the operator of the flight, the pilot, or otherwise connected to it. Registry data reproduced by FlightAware gives the company's address as Aurora, Oregon, and shows it holding at least two — and N90FL, a 1998 Cessna 172R — both with certificates issued in December 2020. No company website, directory listing, regulator record of an operating certificate, or record of its officers or managers could be established from available sources. Geographic reference data places Los Banos in Merced County, California, at a settlement elevation of 121 feet, 1.0 miles WNW of Los Banos Municipal Airport (KLSN). That locates the town and not the accident site, which the record does not specify more precisely. As a matter of record only, the NTSB database, which begins in 2008, contains one prior case for this airframe: GAA16CA416 at Palm Springs, California, on August 3, 2016. The database also contains 232 other cases involving the , of which 27 involved a fatality. Neither the airframe history nor the type record says anything about the cause of this accident.

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Reference data

From aircraft and geographic registries, not from the news sources. Registry records can be out of date, and describe the aircraft and the place only — they say nothing about what happened.

Registration
N5203H
Type
Cessna 172S — single-engine piston landplane
Engines
LYCOMING IO-360-L2A
Built
2004-01-01 (21 years old)
Registered owner
Tegridy Equipment Leasing LlcThe owner of record is not necessarily the operator, the pilot, or otherwise connected to the flight.
Terrain elevation
121 ft
Nearest aerodrome
1.0 miles ESE of Los Banos Municipal Airport (KLSN/LSN)

Sources

Revision history

  1. Version 27 Aug 2026, 14:07current

    Added a paragraph of geographic reference data locating Los Banos and the nearest aerodrome, with a note that it does not locate the accident site.

  2. Version 15 Aug 2026, 21:28

    First published.

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