ANC90FA105 · Cessna 185
Cessna 185 · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From No airport to Lake Hood Seaplane Base (LHD)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC90FA105
- 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
- 2 · 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
Cessna 185
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 185
- 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
- N185KA
- Operator
- Kaylor, Ronald W. · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From No airportTo Lake Hood Seaplane Base (LHD), Anchorage, AK
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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
- Stall/mush
- 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 weight and balance, exceeded
- Pilot in command › Judgment, poor
- Pilot in command › Overconfidence in personal ability
- Pilot in command › Procedures/directives, not followed
- Pilot in command › Stall/mush, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT ELECTED TO TAKE OFF FROM A REMOTE LAKE IN GUSTY, TURBULENT WIND CONDITIONS. THE AIRPLANE WAS ESTIMATED TO BE 245 POUNDS OVER GROSS ALLOWABLE WEIGHT, AND ONLY FOUR SEATS AND SEAT BELTS WERE AVAILABLE FOR THE SIX PEOPLE ABOARD. WITNESSES SAID THAT THE AIRPLANE WAS PULLED OFF THE LAKE ABRUPTLY AND CLIMBED AT A STEEP ATTITUDE UNTIL APPROXIMATELY 20 FEET AGL. THE AIRPLANE THEN STRUCK THE WATER HARD WITH THE RIGHT FLOAT AND TURNED UPSIDE DOWN. RESCUERS INCLUDED A PILOT/PHYSICIAN AND LODGE OWNER WHO PROMPTLY REACHED THE SCENE AND SUCCESSFULLY ADMINISTERED CPR TO AN UNCONSCIOUS AND NOT BREATHING ADULT FEMALE AND MALE JUVENILE.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO FOLLOW PROPER PROCEDURES AND DIRECTIVES (EXCESSIVE FLAPS); FAILURE TO OPERATE THE AIRPLANE WITHIN THE ALLOWABLE GROSS WEIGHT LIMITATIONS; IMPROPER COMPENSATION FOR WIND CONDITIONS AND FAILURE TO MAINTAIN MINIMUM SAFE FLYING SPEED, RESULTING IN A STALL/MUSH.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC90FA105
- Event ID
- 20001212X23565
- Case number
- ANC90FA105
- 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 1990-07-02.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 72329266b6e7f774c79dee9486c6745aa4b5fa48ebfaa592777039350d459f84; retrieved 2026-09-21T02:31:45.294Z.