LAX98FA039 · Mooney M20
Mooney M20 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather during initial climb
From L35 to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX98FA039
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Mooney M20
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N5231B
- Operator
- John A. Marshall · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From L35To 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
- 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
- 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
- Visual flight rules (VFR) flight into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC)
- 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 › Spatial disorientation
- Pilot in command › VFR flight into imc, performed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The non-instrument rated pilot performed a preflight inspection, and taxied east to the approach end of runway 26, where he made an engine run-up. Weather at the airport was reported to be 200 feet overcast, visibility 3/4 mile with fog, and the wind calm. Witnesses indicated that to the east, they observed blue sky and the rising sun, while to the west and south, they observed low clouds and restricted visibility. The pilot elected to takeoff west on runway 26. Witnesses indicated that after takeoff, the airplane climbed into the clouds, and within 60 seconds, it descended from the clouds in a steep left bank. The airplane crashed on a mountainside, 0.8 miles from the airport, while in a nose low and steep left bank attitude. Impact occurred at an elevation of about 6,850 feet; elevation of the airport was 6,748 feet. The accident occurred 10 days after the pilot was issued a private pilot certificate. Examination of the wreckage revealed evidence of oil leakage in an aft direction on the airplane's belly and on the engine's exterior. Also, a puddle of oil was found on the hangar floor, below where the engine would have been, while the airplane was parked. However, no evidence of oil starvation, overheat distress signatures, or loss of engine power were found. The attitude indicator had a history of precession. The baggage compartment door of the airplane and the pilot's lap belt were found unlatched. No maintenance logs were located. The pilot's former flight instructor (CFI) reported that the pilot had 'tinkered' with the engine to stop oil leakage. Also, the CFI characterized the pilot as being an aggressive student.
Probable cause
VFR flight by the pilot into instrument meteorological conditions (VMC), which led to spatial disorientation, loss of aircraft control, and an uncontrolled descent into terrain. Related factors were: the adverse weather conditions, the pilot's lack of instrument experience, overconfidence of the pilot in his personal ability, and possible pilot distraction due to an unlatched baggage door, which was not properly secured during preflight.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX98FA039
- Event ID
- 20001208X09193
- Case number
- LAX98FA039
- 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: a518e136c8caed7229e6df041487b81a186ee5a217f65c7a1704f0c29e46a20b; retrieved 2026-09-20T22:45:34.001Z.