SEA92LA163 · Grumman American AA-5A
Grumman American AA-5A · Accident: in flight collision with object during landing
From 59S · Vancouver, WA to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA92LA163
- 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
Grumman American AA-5A
- Aircraft type
- Grumman American AA-5
- 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
- N26671
- Operator
- Van Bladeren, Ronald W.
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 59S · Vancouver, WATo 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
- Landing · aborted
- 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 collision with object
- 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); Wire, transmission
- 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 › Go-around, delayed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AFTER EXECUTING AN APPROACH TO THE EAST RUNWAY THE PILOT OF THE AA-5A PERCEIVED A 'SIGNIFICANT TAILWIND' DURING HIS FLARE. WITH 1300 FEET OF THE 2000 FOOT LONG RUNWAY REMAINING, AND AT 50 MPH HE ELECTED TO ABORT THE LANDING AND GO AROUND. THE PILOT REPORTED APPLYING 'FULL POWER, FLAPS UP AND CARB HEAT OFF' AND THEN STATED THAT 'AS THE FLAPS RETRACTED THE LAST 15 TO 20 DEGREES, THE AIRCRAFT BEGAN TO LEVEL OFF.' THE AIRCRAFT IMPACTED TREES AND THEN POWER LINES BEYOND THE DEPARTURE END OF THE RWY DURING THE ATTEMPTED GO AROUND. AN FAA EXAMINER ON SITE AT THE TIME OF THE ACCIDENT REPORTED AN 8 TO 10 KNOT TAILWIND AND POST CRASH EXAMINATION OF THE AIRCRAFT BY FAA PERSONNEL REVEALED THE CARB HEAT IN THE FULL OUT (ON) POSITION. STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURES FOR THE AA-5A CALL FOR CARB HEAT 'OFF' AND FLAPS 'RETRACT, AFTER ACCELERATING TO SAFE AIRSPEED' FOR BALKED LANDINGS.
Probable cause
THE PILOT IN COMMAND'S DELAYED DECISION TO EXECUTE A GO AROUND. FACTORS CONTRIBUTING THE ACCIDENT WERE: A TAILWIND, TREES, AND THE IMPROPER USE OF THE CARBURETOR HEAT AND FLAPS BY THE PILOT IN COMMAND.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA92LA163
- Event ID
- 20001211X15263
- Case number
- SEA92LA163
- 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: fbcfd0d9aeb9696710b61a0d33d865744efc4eb16d843243acbb14969d9f69a3; retrieved 2026-09-23T02:54:17.373Z.