MIA89LA076 · Waco YMF
Waco YMF · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From FYW · Key West, FL to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA89LA076
- 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
Waco YMF
- Aircraft type
- Waco YMF
- 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
- N99Y
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From FYW · Key West, FLTo 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
- Maneuvering
- 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
- 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 › Altitude, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Maneuver, excessive
- Pilot in command › Wake turbulence, encountered
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT STATED THEY HAD JUST PASSED OVER A SCHOOL OF DOLPHIN WHILE ON A SIGHTSEEING FLT OVER WATER AT ABOUT 100 FT. HE REVERSED COURSE TO THE LEFT IN ORDER TO RETURN TO THE FISH & WHILE IN THE TURN THE ACFT ROLLED ABRUPTLY TO THE LEFT. ACFT ROLLED INTO A VERT BANK & THE ACFT HIT THE WATER INVERTED & SANK IN ABOUT 12 FT OF WATER. THE PLT STATED THAT HE HAD OBSERVED A C-130 TYPE ACFT FLYING IN THE AREA AT APPROX 800 FT JUST BEFORE THE ACCIDENT. THE PLT STATED THAT HE & HIS WIFE RECALLED HE HAD BEEN MAKING A LOW STEEP BANK OVER THE WATER AND HE RECALLED GRAVITY FORCES PRESSING THEM DOWN INTO THE SEAT DURING THE TURN. THEY HAD COMPLETED THE 1ST STEEP TURN AND WERE IN THE 2ND BANK OF ABOUT 90 DEGS WHEN A 'GUST' WAS FELT & THE NEXT THING THEY KNEW, THEY HIT THE WATER UPSIDE DOWN. NEITHER PAX RECALLED SEEING ANY OTHER ACFT IN THE AREA. ONE PAX STATED THAT HE HAD SOME PREVIOUS FLT TIME INCLUDING SOLO.
Probable cause
THE INABILITY OF THE PLT TO MAINTAIN CONTROL AFTER ENCOUNTERING HIS OWN WAKE TURBULENCE AT A LOW ALTITUDE DURING A STEEP TURNING MANEUVER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA89LA076
- Event ID
- 20001213X27765
- Case number
- MIA89LA076
- 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: 889a94c0fe109a6b4131eb3b10ae11cf8d54e5236eec9f4b208cd3af7679691c; retrieved 2026-09-22T00:17:50.234Z.