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BFO86LA041 · Bellanca CITABRIA

23 Aug 1986 · Pasadena, MD, United States

Bellanca CITABRIA · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach

From Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport (BWI) to an unrecorded destination

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Event

NTSB case
BFO86LA041
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

Bellanca CITABRIA

Aircraft type
Bellanca CITABRIA
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
N41464
Operator
Robert L. Burns · private individual
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport (BWI), Baltimore, MDTo 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
Approach · VFR go-around
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/spin
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

  • Dual student › Proper touchdown point, exceeded
  • Pilot in command › Go-around, delayed
  • Pilot in command › Recovery from bounced landing, improper
  • Pilot in command(cfi) › Airspeed, not maintained

Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

ONE WITNESS WHO WATCHED N41464 MAKE THE APPROACH INDICATED THAT THE AIRCRAFT APPEARED TO BE TOO FAST AS IT PASSED THE 1/2 WAY POINT ON THE RUNWAY AND THAT IT BOUNCED BACK UP INTO THE AIR AFTER NOSING DOWN ONTO THE TURF RUNWAY. THE NOSE OF THE AIRCRAFT CAME UP AND THE LEFT WING WENT DOWN AS THE AIRCRAFT FLEW ALONG THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE RUNWAY. WITH ABOUT 1/3 OF 1800 FOOT RUNWAY LEFT THE WITNESS HEARD POWER BEING APPLIED TO THE ENGINE AND OBSERVED THE AIRCRAFT CLIMB ABOVE TREES AT THE END OF THE RUNWAY WITH THE ATTITUDE OF THE AIRCRAFT CONTINUING TO BE EXTREMELY NOSE HIGH. HE THEN SAW THE RIGHT WING DROP AND THE AIRCRAFT SPIN INTO SOME TREES. EXAM OF A/C DID NOT DISCLOSE ANY MALFUNCTIONS. THE ENG WAS MOUNTED ON A TEST STAND AND RUN SUCCESSFULLY.

Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record BFO86LA041
Event ID
20001213X34408
Case number
BFO86LA041
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: b99dd2341b8f68e3e03cbf4ede0ffbdca2b797704d42d7b5ed32ae655b490ee8; retrieved 2026-09-23T14:06:27.966Z.