SEA00LA088 · Avions Mudry et Cie CAP 231
Avions Mudry et Cie CAP 231 · Accident during takeoff
From Ephrata Municipal Airport (EPH) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA00LA088
- 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
Avions Mudry et Cie CAP 231
- Aircraft type
- Avions Mudry Et Cie CAP-231
- 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
- N231X
- Operator
- Norman R. Willis · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ephrata Municipal Airport (EPH)To 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
- Takeoff
- 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
- Miscellaneous/other
- 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 › Aircraft control, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that shortly after becoming airborne (30-40 feet above ground level [AGL]), the aircraft's canopy blew opened. He reported that when the canopy opened, a blast of air blew off his left contact lens obscuring his vision and depth perception. After unsuccessful attempts to latch the canopy, the pilot closed the throttle and aborted the takeoff. When the airplane touched down, on the runway, it bounced back into the air. The pilot applied full power and initiated a go-around. He reported that after initiating the go-around, he turned the airplane to the south in an attempt to land on runway 11. However, the pilot was unable to maintain altitude, as a result of damage sustained to the propeller during the bounced landing, and the airplane subsequently collided with terrain. Post-accident inspection of the airplane by an FAA inspector from the Spokane, Washington, Flight Standards District Office, and the airplane owner, revealed that the canopy latch functioned properly. The pilot later stated that he could not confirm that the canopy was latched properly prior to the accident flight.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain aircraft control subsequent to the aircraft's canopy opening in flight. Factors include the pilot's failure confirm that the aircraft's canopy was secured prior to takeoff and impaired vision.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA00LA088
- Event ID
- 20001212X21122
- Case number
- SEA00LA088
- 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: ca8dcf4e11dfe3fe7e3405cf8c1eca9f63601d42c59fc1fdc7998ab4cd023480; retrieved 2026-09-21T20:13:33.815Z.