LAX95FA053 · North American NAVION-A
North American NAVION-A · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Whiteman Airport (WHP)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX95FA053
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
North American NAVION-A
- Aircraft type
- North American NAVION-A
- 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
- N8794H
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Whiteman Airport (WHP), PACOIMA, CA
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Stall/mush; Tree(s)
- 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
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, not attained
- Pilot in command › Rotation, excessive
- Pilot in command › Stall/mush, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
WITNESSES REPORTED THAT THE AIRCRAFT LIFTED OFF RUNWAY 8 IN AN UNUSUALLY NOSE-HIGH ATTITUDE WITH A SHALLOW CLIMB ANGLE. THE AIRCRAFT CONTINUED ON THE RUNWAY HEADING UNTIL IT SETTLED INTO A GROUP OF TREES 0.4 MILES FROM THE END OF THE RUNWAY. THE AIRCRAFT OWNER'S MANUAL INDICATED THE DISTANCE REQUIRED TO TAKE OFF AND CLEAR A 50-FOOT OBSTACLE UNDER NO WIND CONDITIONS WOULD BE APPROXIMATELY 4,700 FEET. THE 5,850-FOOT-LONG, HARD-SURFACED RUNWAY HAS A SLIGHT RISE IN THE CENTER, BUT OTHERWISE HAS NO SLOPE. WINDS WERE 7 KNOTS FROM 080 DEGREES. WING FLAPS WERE NOT UTILIZED. THE STAND OF TREES OFF THE END OF THE RUNWAY WAS BETWEEN 25 TO 35 FEET IN HEIGHT AND SITUATED ON SLIGHTLY RISING TERRAIN. NO SIGNIFICANT DISCREPANCIES WERE NOTED IN THE EXAMINATION OF THE ENGINE OR AIRFRAME. THE SAFETY BOARD CONCURS WITH THE TECHNICIAN THAT THE ABNORMALITY FOUND IN THE CARBURETOR HAD NO ROLE IN THE CAUSE OF THIS ACCIDENT. THE AIRPORT ELEVATION IS 6,750 FEET AND THE TEMPERATURE WAS ABOUT 51 DEGREES. THE DENSITY ALTITUDE WAS CALCULATED TO BE 7,600 FEET.
Probable cause
the pilot's initial overrotation, his failure to attain the proper climb airspeed, and an inadvertent entry into a stall mush condition. A factor in the accident was the high-density altitude.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX95FA053
- Event ID
- 20001206X02736
- Case number
- LAX95FA053
- 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: 332566e4fbf19c302436fad1b2b91ace3765bd4efc0642137a4e64c3395d626a; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:54:44.240Z.