SEA95LA070 · Quicksilver MXL2
Quicksilver MXL2 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water during an uncontrolled descent
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA95LA070
- 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
Quicksilver MXL2
- Aircraft type
- Quicksilver MXL2
- 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
- UNREG
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- 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
- Uncontrolled descent
- 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
- In flight collision with terrain/water
- 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
- 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(vs), not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
WITNESSES REPORTED THAT THE UNCERTIFIED PILOT HAD JUST FUELED THE AIRPLANE WHEN AN INDIVIDUAL APPROACHED HIM AND ASKED FOR A RIDE. THE AIRPLANE WAS THEN OBSERVED TAKING OFF FROM A DIRT ROAD IN AN INDUSTRIAL AREA. THE AIRPLANE MAINTAINED FLIGHT JUST ABOVE THE GROUND, UNTIL IT REACHED THE END OF THE ROAD, WHERE A FENCE WAS CLEARED. THE AIRPLANE THEN BEGAN TO GAIN ALTITUDE. TEN MINUTES LATER, THE AIRPLANE WAS SEEN IN A STEEP RIGHT TURN APPROXIMATELY 200 FEET ABOVE THE GROUND. THE AIRPLANE AERODYNAMICALLY STALLED IN THE TURN. THE NOSE OF THE AIRPLANE DROPPED WHILE IN THE TURN AND THE AIRPLANE DESCENDED TO THE GROUND IN A NOSE-DOWN ATTITUDE. IT WAS REPORTED THAT THE PILOT HAD ACCUMULATED ABOUT 2 HOURS OF INSTRUCTIONAL FLIGHT AT THE TIME OF PURCHASE, AND A TOTAL FLIGHT TIME OF TEN HOURS. ANOTHER PILOT WHO HAD FLOWN THE AIRPLANE, REPORTED THE AIRPLANE'S WEIGHT AND PERFORMANCE CAPABILITIES WERE EXCEEDED WITH THE COMBINED WEIGHT OF THE TWO OCCUPANTS AND FULL FUEL.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN ADEQUATE AIRSPEED WHILE BANKING THE AIRPLANE. THIS LED TO AN UNRECOVERABLE AERODYNAMIC STALL IN CLOSE PROXIMITY TO THE GROUND. FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT ARE THE PILOT EXCEEDING THE AIRPLANE'S WEIGHT AND BALANCE LIMITATIONS, AND HIS LACK OF TOTAL FLIGHT EXPERIENCE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA95LA070
- Event ID
- 20001207X03201
- Case number
- SEA95LA070
- 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: 60e6ce4dfd5c116022f4c36286c3bf5397c74df1e83b19e2beb85e7bd15038db; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:51:06.057Z.