The pilot of a homebuilt; high wing tail dragger lost control during the landing roll and exited the...

Narrative:

My route took me near a small airport on my short flight home. Thinking I would benefit from a couple take offs and landings on pavement I announced my intention to land to local traffic in the area. I set up a normal base approach and touchdown was uneventful. As the tail wheel settled; a quartering wind forced my tail to the right even though I had aileron rolled toward the cross wind. I touched the right brake hoping to correct. It continued to the left and then I added full throttle to go around. Normally the plane leaps back into the air straightening itself. This time it did not but continued to weathervane to the left. I exited the runway on the left side and; not quite airborne; went down the bank of the runway into the cattails. Skinned knuckles only; but once outside the aircraft realized I had chosen the runway direction to land that had been more down wind than up wind. My slowing aircraft had made my aileron/rudder corrections become reverse to what was needed to maintain my heading down the runway. In retrospect; I should have not made the spontaneous decision to proceed to landing without first confirming local wind conditions by over flying the field and checking the sock; or tuning to AWOS.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: The Pilot of a homebuilt; high wing tail dragger lost control during the landing roll and exited the runway; suffering only very minor injuries. No damage to the aircraft was reported. Reporter cited an undetected rear quartering crosswind as contributory.

Narrative: My route took me near a small airport on my short flight home. Thinking I would benefit from a couple take offs and landings on pavement I announced my intention to land to local traffic in the area. I set up a normal base approach and touchdown was uneventful. As the tail wheel settled; a quartering wind forced my tail to the right even though I had aileron rolled toward the cross wind. I touched the right brake hoping to correct. It continued to the left and then I added full throttle to go around. Normally the plane leaps back into the air straightening itself. This time it did not but continued to weathervane to the left. I exited the runway on the left side and; not quite airborne; went down the bank of the runway into the cattails. Skinned knuckles only; but once outside the aircraft realized I had chosen the runway direction to land that had been more down wind than up wind. My slowing aircraft had made my aileron/rudder corrections become reverse to what was needed to maintain my heading down the runway. In retrospect; I should have not made the spontaneous decision to proceed to landing without first confirming local wind conditions by over flying the field and checking the sock; or tuning to AWOS.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	968292
Time
Date	201109
Local Time Of Day	1801-2400
Place
Locale Reference	8D7.Airport
State Reference	SD
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Other
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Landing
Route In Use	Visual Approach
Flight Plan	None
Person 1
Function	Pilot Flying Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Private
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 16.4 Flight Crew Total 478 Flight Crew Type 125
Events
Anomaly	Ground Excursion Runway Inflight Event / Encounter Loss Of Aircraft Control

The pilot of a homebuilt; high wing tail dragger lost control during the landing roll and exited the runway; suffering only very minor injuries. No damage to the aircraft was reported. Reporter cited an undetected rear quartering crosswind as contributory.