SEA96LA215 · Bellanca 7ECA
Bellanca 7ECA and Piper J3C-65 · Accident: collision between aircraft (not in flight) while taxiing
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA96LA215
- 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
- 0 · 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
Aircraft 1 · Bellanca 7ECA
- Aircraft type
- Bellanca 7
- 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
- N8809
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Jefferson County International Airport (0S9), Port Townsend, WATo AWO
- 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
- Taxi · from runway
- 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
- Collision between aircraft (not 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
- Substantial
Aircraft 2 · Piper J3C-65
- 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
- N88334
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From AWOTo 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
- Taxi · to runway
- 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
- Collision between aircraft (not 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Visual lookout, inadequate
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Clearance, not maintained
- Pilot of other aircraft › Clearance, not maintained
- Pilot of other aircraft › Visual lookout, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilots of a Bellanca landed on runway 16, turned off at an exit about 1500 feet from the approach end, then taxied south on the parallel taxiway. At about the same time, the pilot of a Piper J-3 was taxiing north on the same taxiway in order to takeoff on runway 16. The flight instructor in the rear seat of the Bellanca saw the J-3 and moved to the far right side of the taxiway in order to stay clear of the oncoming aircraft. However, the pilot of the J-3, who was also sitting in the rear seat of his aircraft, did not see the oncoming Bellanca, and did not move to his right side of the taxiway; but instead continued north unaware of the other aircraft. As the two tailwheel equipped aircraft neared, the instructor (CFI) in the Bellanca did not continually keep the J-3 in sight. Instead, the CFI assumed that the J-3 had also moved to the right and that his aircraft was '...well clear to the right.' As the aircraft approached each other, clearance was not maintained and they collided on the taxiway.
Probable cause
inadequate visual lookout by the pilot of the Piper J3, and failure of the flight instructor in the Bellance to ensure that clearance was maintained from the other moving aircraft. Factors relating to the accident were: the inherent visual restrictions encountered by pilots of tailwheel equipped aircraft, and the proximity of the other aircraft that was moving on the ground.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA96LA215
- Event ID
- 20001208X06814
- Case number
- SEA96LA215
- 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: d5b721f81ccba7f50ed29b6e6f633385583daac85c31fb94177f8f61fa14c228; retrieved 2026-09-22T21:09:20.346Z.