FTW97FA099 · Aeronca 65-TC
Aeronca 65-TC · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Tucumcari Municipal Airport (TCC)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW97FA099
- 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
Aeronca 65-TC
- Aircraft type
- Aeronca 65
- 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
- N31794
- Operator
- William A. Essenburg · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Tucumcari Municipal Airport (TCC), Tucumcari, NM
- 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/spin
- 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 › Airspeed, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was observed beginning the takeoff roll on runway 26 (elevation 6,201 ft, density altitude 7,000 ft) with winds from the WNW at 10 knots gusting to 25 knots with moderate turbulence. The next morning, an instructor spotted the accident site 1/2 mile south of the airport. The airplane came to rest in a nose low attitude with the empennage folded and twisted to the right. No preimpact discrepancies were found that would have precluded engine and propeller operation. The elevator bellcrank was partially fractured and the elevator was jammed in the full down position. NTSB Metallurgists reported that the bellcrank showed only signs of overstress and no signs of fatigue. The pilot had 4.5 hrs in this make and model. The pilot's toxicological findings were: 0.293 ug/ml Fluoxetine (prescription antidepressant) and 0.333 ug/ml Norfluoxetine (Fluoxetine metabolite) in blood, Nordiazepam in blood and urine, and Oxazepam and Temazepam in urine. Nordiazepam, Oxazepam and Temazepam are metabolites of Diazepam (Valium). None of the drugs are approved by the FAA for use while flying.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maitain airspeed resulting in an inadvertent stall/spin. Factors were gusty winds, turbulence, a high density altitude, and the pilot's lack of total experience in the make and model of aircraft.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW97FA099
- Event ID
- 20001208X07396
- Case number
- FTW97FA099
- 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: ed0d2630292e320680723747c124fc0b0defd81debfac4512647f7f22a57bfde; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:02:50.905Z.