LAX94FA217 · Mooney M20K
Mooney M20K · Accident: loss of control in flight en route
From Camarillo International Airport (CMA) to SDZ · Sedona, AZ
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX94FA217
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 2 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Mooney M20K
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N231WD
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Camarillo International Airport (CMA), Camarillo, CATo SDZ · Sedona, AZ
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- En route · climb to cruise
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Loss of control in flight
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Flightcrew › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Flightcrew › Spatial disorientation
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOTS DEPARTED ON AN IFR FLIGHT WITH CLEARANCE TO CLIMB TO VFR CONDITIONS ON TOP. THE TOPS OF THE CLOUDS WERE REPORTED AT 2500 FEET. THE PERSON IN THE RIGHT FRONT SEAT HELD AN INSTRUMENT RATING AND WAS PRESUMED TO BE THE FIRST PILOT (PIC). THE PERSON IN THE LEFT FRONT SEAT WAS ALSO A PILOT, BUT DID NOT POSSESS AN INSTRUMENT RATING. THE AIRPLANE WAS EQUIPPED WITH A SINGLE SET OF FLIGHT INSTRUMENTS IN FRONT OF THE LEFT SEAT. ACCORDING TO RECORDED RADAR DATA, THE AIRPLANE DID NOT REACH AN ALTITUDE WHERE VFR CONDITIONS WERE REPORTED. AT ABOUT 2300 TO 2400 FEET MSL, THE AIRPLANE ENTERED A DESCENT, THEN RADAR CONTACT WAS LOST. WITNESSES HEARD AND SAW THE AIRPLANE IN A STEEP DIVE AS IT DESCENDED BELOW THE ESTIMATED 500-FOOT OVERCAST. NO PREIMPACT MECHANICAL FAILURE OR MALFUNCTION OF THE AIRPLANE WAS FOUND.
Probable cause
FAILURE OF THE FLIGHT CREW TO MAINTAIN CONTROL OF THE AIRPLANE IN INSTRUMENT METEOROLOGICAL CONDITIONS (IMC), DUE TO SPATIAL DISORIENTATION. A FACTOR RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WAS: THE FIRST PILOT'S OVERCONFIDENCE IN HIS ABILITY TO ASSURE CONTROL OF THE AIRPLANE FROM THE RIGHT SEAT BY REFERENCE TO THE INSTRUMENTS LOCATED IN FRONT OF THE LEFT SEAT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX94FA217
- Event ID
- 20001206X01314
- Case number
- LAX94FA217
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 9f628b3dc092b7f07e06d958cd05241cc256b29fb8d5ee1e5140a967ac73414d; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:10:02.262Z.