LAX91LA284 · Beech E-55
Beech E-55 · Accident: complete gear collapsed during landing
From Camarillo International Airport (CMA) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX91LA284
- 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
Beech E-55
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft E-55
- 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
- N7268R
- Operator
- Brian Payne
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Camarillo International Airport (CMA), Camarillo, CATo 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 · landing roll
- 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
- Complete gear collapsed
- 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 › Gear retraction, improper use of
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE LANDING GEAR COLLAPSED DURING THE LANDING ROLL. THE PILOT HAD ACCUMULATED A TOTAL OF 27 HOURS IN THE AIRPLANE AFTER RECEIVING A MULTIENGINE RATING. EXAMINATION OF THE AIRPLANE AT THE SCENE SHOWED THE GEAR HANDLE IN THE DOWN POSITION AND THE LANDING GEAR CIRCUIT BREAKER POPPED. DAMAGE TO THE GEAR DOORS AND GEAR ACTUATING RODS INDICATED THAT THE PILOT SELECTED GEAR UP INSTEAD OF FLAPS UP BEFORE THE GEAR STRUT SQUAT SWITCHES ACTIVATED TO PREVENT THE GEAR FROM RETRACTING. THE PILOT THEN SELECTED THE GEAR DOWN POSITION BUT THE WEIGHT OF THE AIRPLANE PREVENTED THE GEAR FROM EXTENDING, POPPING THE GEAR MOTOR CIRCUIT BREAKER. PRIOR TO OPERATING THE ACCIDENT AIRPLANE, IN THE LAST 12 MONTHS, THE PILOT OPERATED A TAILWHEEL, FIXED GEAR AIRPLANE.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S IMPROPER USE OF THE LANDING GEAR RETRACTION BY SELECTING GEAR UP INSTEAD OF FLAPS UP DURING THE LANDING ROLL-OUT. CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT WAS THE LACK OF FAMILIARITY WITH THE AIRPLANE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX91LA284
- Event ID
- 20001212X17579
- Case number
- LAX91LA284
- 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: 19e97f91efd4f4c42ba03871339cb637eac08bdf34f0ce5e9a13a52ba2a76b8d; retrieved 2026-09-23T04:00:19.427Z.