CHI96LA222 · Piper J3C-90
Piper J3C-90 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather while maneuvering
From John H Batten Airport (RAC) to John H Batten Airport (RAC)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI96LA222
- 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
- 1 · 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
Piper J3C-90
- Aircraft type
- Piper J3
- 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
- N77563
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From John H Batten Airport (RAC)To John H Batten Airport (RAC)
- 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
- Maneuvering
- 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 encounter with weather
- 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 › Remedial action, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was part of an airshow act depicting a 'student pilot' flying the airplane without a flight instructor. A video tape of the airplane's flight showed it flying level at 100 feet above the ground. The airplane pitched up about 5 degrees and then pitched down as it began a left turn. The bank angle increased to about 90 degrees and the airplane pitched down to about 30 degrees below level flight at the 90 degree point in its turn. The airplane continued to pitch down until it collided with the ground. The video tape showed the airplane's rudder moving left and right during its descent. The aileron control position was for a right bank and the elevator was in the up position for the last half of the flight. The on-scene investigation revealed no anomalies with the airplane's flight control system or engine that would prevent flight. Surface winds were reported at 15 to 20 knots with gusts to 28 knots.
Probable cause
was improper remdial action by the pilot after encountering a stall when the elevator back pressure was not removed and the ailerons were positioned for a right bank by that increasing the airplane's left yaw/roll action. Factors in this accident were a stall encountered by the pilot, high winds, and gusting wind conditions.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI96LA222
- Event ID
- 20001208X05942
- Case number
- CHI96LA222
- 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: 9816410e721b2e4c5eb6460389ee247651f41e98d88f4f85c156b58c4270c12c; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:18:03.086Z.