DEN88LA194 · Lake LA-4-200
Lake LA-4-200 · Accident: on ground/water collision with object during landing
From Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport (BZN) to No airport
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN88LA194
- 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
Lake LA-4-200
- Aircraft type
- Lake LA-4
- 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
- N1299L
- Operator
- Cook, Lew W. · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport (BZN), Belgrade, MTTo No airport
- 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
- On ground/water collision with object
- 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 › Procedures/directives, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT AND HIS PAX DEPARTED BZN AT 1500 MDT AND FLEW TO HUGHES BAY ON FLATHEAD LAKE, NEAR LAKESIDE, MT, ARRIVING AT APRX 1700. THE PLT SAID HE NOTICED A DIMINISHING WAVE PATTERN FROM THE SOUTHWEST AND A STRONG GUST SURFACE PATTERN FROM THE EAST. THERE WERE NO WHITECAPS BUT THE WATER WAS ROUGHER TOWARDS THE MIDDLE OF THE LAKE. HE ESTIMATED THE WINDS WERE FROM THE EAST AT 5 KTS. THE PLT DRAGGED THE INTENDED LANDING AREA AND DECIDED IT WAS SAFE TO LAND. PLT MADE STEP-LANDING. ACFT GRAZED FIRST WAVE AT 65 MPH, BOUNCED OFF SECOND WAVE, AND SETTLED ON THIRD WAVE. IT THEN SPUN 90 DEG TO THE RIGHT. THE PLT LATER DISCOVERED THE LEFT FLOAT COLLAPSED, THE RIGHT FLOAT CRUSHED, AND OTHER SUBSTANTIAL DAMAGE TO THE AFT FUSELAGE. THE PLT SUSPECTS HE STRUCK FLOATING DEBRIS IN THE LAKE. THE PILOT OPERATING HANDBOOK RECOMMENDS A FULL STALL LANDING IN HIGH WIND/WAVE CONDITIONS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN88LA194
- Event ID
- 20001213X26552
- Case number
- DEN88LA194
- 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: 5b9c81e8cb52271987034a4406f2a3605549f9355db0c83cc4372c17ee5a24a5; retrieved 2026-09-23T09:03:12.248Z.