SEA91LA088 · Luscombe 8A
Luscombe 8A · Accident: in flight collision with object en route
From Thompson Falls Airport (THM) to S62 · SILVERWOOD, ID
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA91LA088
- 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
Luscombe 8A
- Aircraft type
- Luscombe 8
- 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
- N45656
- Operator
- Paul F. Clock · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Thompson Falls Airport (THM), Thompson Falls, MTTo S62 · SILVERWOOD, ID
- 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
- En route · cruise
- 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
- 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 › Proper altitude, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
WHILE IN CRUISE FLIGHT OVER A RIVER, THE PILOT REPORTED THAT THE WINDSHIELD SUDDENLY BLEW OUT. THE PILOT THOUGHT THAT THE AIRPLANE HAD BEEN STRUCK BY A BIRD. THE AIRPLANE BECAME DIRECTIONALLY UNSTABLE AND THE PILOT OPTED TO DITCH THE AIRPLANE IN THE RIVER. THE LOCAL SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT PERSONNEL REPORTED THAT A DOWNED WIRE THAT RAN ACROSS THE RIVER WAS FOUND IN THE VICINITY OF THE ACCIDENT SITE.
Probable cause
THE PILOT-IN-COMMAND'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN PROPER ALTITUDE IN CRUISE LIGHT RESULTING IN AN IN FLIGHT COLLISION WITH A WIRE AND SUBSEQUENT FORCED LANDING IN A RIVER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA91LA088
- Event ID
- 20001212X16889
- Case number
- SEA91LA088
- 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 1991-04-19.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 04ef4b3c82936aff263f374f77b36afed25f12db3bd67558bbd72f41b391b59f; retrieved 2026-09-23T04:18:43.679Z.