CHI00LA097 · Taylorcraft DC-65
Taylorcraft DC-65 · Accident: in flight collision with object during initial climb
From Jerry Sumners Sr Aurora Municipal Airport (2H2) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI00LA097
- 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
Taylorcraft DC-65
- Aircraft type
- Taylorcraft DC-65
- 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
- N67754
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Jerry Sumners Sr Aurora Municipal Airport (2H2), Aurora, MOTo 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 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)
- 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 › Clearance, not attained
- Pilot in command › Climb, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported the airplane touched down 1/3 the way down the 1,500', grass airstrip. He said the airplane bounced and he noticed the airspeed was higher than 55 miles per hour (mph) he had established on final approach. He determined he could not stop before the end of the runway so he applied full power and established the best climb possible. The pilot reported the climb was very slow with two people aboard and the airplane contacted trees off the end of the airstrip prior to descending to impact with the terrain. The pilot purchased the airplane a couple days prior to the accident. He reported the airplane had been restored in 1990. The flight manual showed a stall speed of 45 mph, approach/departure speed of 55 mph, and a best cruise speed of 83 mph at 2150 rpm. The pilot reported his climb speed on takeoff from Aurora was 55 mph, and his cruise speed during the flight was 75 mph at 2150 rpm.
Probable cause
an inadequate rate of climb and the failure to attain clearance with the trees during the aborted landing. Factors associated with the accident were the pilot's failure to attain a proper touchdown point during the landing, the trees which were contacted, and the pilot's lack of familiarity with this specific airplane.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI00LA097
- Event ID
- 20001212X20599
- Case number
- CHI00LA097
- 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: 4d0083fd68dae2556540c00cd0a38923a5908161de63a124cb4f5c90fead3b3e; retrieved 2026-09-21T10:40:59.892Z.