LAX97FA049 · Beech 95-C55
Beech 95-C55 · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From IMP · Imperial, CA to Brown Field Municipal Airport (SDM)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX97FA049
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Beech 95-C55
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 55
- 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
- N3774Q
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From IMP · Imperial, CATo Brown Field Municipal Airport (SDM)
- 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
- Approach · IFR missed approach
- 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/spin
- 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 › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Became lost/disoriented
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, not followed
- Pilot in command › Stall/spin, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot (plt) got 2 weather (wx) briefings & was advised of deteriorating IFR wx in the destination area. When he filed an IFR flight plan, he told the briefer that he did not have his charts; the briefer looked up the airway designations & fixes for the plt. Near the destination, TRACON told the plt the airport (arpt) was below minimums, & that 3 aircraft (acft) had made missed approaches without seeing the ground. The controller then suggested nearby arpts that were above approach minimums as alternates. The plt said his car was parked at the arpt, & he wanted to make the approach. Radar data disclosed the acft flew the approach segments at least 1,000 higher than the charted altitudes at speeds between 180 & 155 kts. The acft overflew the missed approach point & arpt, then crossed the adjacent US/Mexico border before ATC could instruct the plt to make an immediate missed approach. The plt responded on the radio 'I guess I don't know where I am.' Radar data showed the acft climbing & descending rapidly as it reversed course, then descend to 300 ft agl as it neared the west arpt boundary. The plt transmitted that he thought he had the arpt in sight. Four seconds later, the acft impacted the departure end of the runway. Ground witnesses observed the acft in cloud bases, & they noted that it narrowly missed a building; it then turned sharply toward the runway before descending steeply to ground impact. The pilot's logbook did not show that he had met instrument currency requirements of 14 CFR 91.
Probable cause
the pilot's lack of situational awareness (becoming lost/disoriented during the approach), his failure to fly the approach as charted, and his failure to maintain aircraft control, while attempting an abrupt turn toward the airport, which led to an inadvertent stall/spin. The pilot's lack of recent instrument experience was a related factor.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX97FA049
- Event ID
- 20001208X07058
- Case number
- LAX97FA049
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1996-11-22.
- API snapshot SHA-256: e232e533f7c7137917321e2ff8fa96da3257a54bad48cf726d9d231b5509747e; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:06:25.946Z.