IAD97LA091 · Aeronca S15AC
Aeronca S15AC · Accident: loss of control on ground/water while taxiing
From NH (no airport) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD97LA091
- 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
Aeronca S15AC
- Aircraft type
- Aeronca S15
- 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
- N1105H
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From NH (no airport)To 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
- 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 on ground/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
- Tree(s)
- 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 › Compensation for wind conditions, inadequate
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Laconia, NH, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was water taxiing the seaplane and performing a magneto check 'on the step.' The pilot said he was completing the run-up phase, and the airspeed was close to lift-off speed, when a gust of wind caught the left wing. The airplane became airborne prematurely, and the wind blew the airplane sideways where it struck trees. The reported wind at the time of the accident was 330 degrees at 11 knots, with gusts to 15 knots. The pilot reported that there was no mechanical malfunction with the airplane or engine. The water rudder was found in the down position.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate compensation for a crosswind, which resulted in the loss of aircraft control. A factor in the accident was the gusting winds.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD97LA091
- Event ID
- 20001208X08154
- Case number
- IAD97LA091
- 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: 0cf6ec656618dfb24f13c5b0f661970365c8bb7cc52a2409a4e5d1ac4127beda; retrieved 2026-09-22T19:28:37.689Z.