NYC82FNC04 · Aeronca 7EC
Turner Aviation Aeronca 7EC · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From New Gloucester, ME to New Gloucester, ME
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC82FNC04
- 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
- 1 · 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
Aeronca 7EC
- Aircraft type
- Aeronca 7
- 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
- N4393C
- Operator
- Turner Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From New Gloucester, METo New Gloucester, ME
- 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
- 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
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Altitude, misjudged
- Pilot in command › Clearance, misjudged
- Pilot in command › Stall, inadvertent
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of New Gloucester, ME, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT FLEW THE SKI EQUIPPED AIRCRAFT TO A FROZEN LAKE WHERE HE MET TWO FRIENDS WHO WERE ICE FISHING. LATER, AFTER HE VISITED WITH HIS FRIENDS AND HAD GIVEN EACH OF THEM A RIDE IN THE AIRCRAFT, THE PILOT TOOK OFF AGAIN. AFTER TAKEOFF, THE PILOT TURNED BACK AT LOW ALTITUDE AND FLEW OVER THE VICINITY OF HIS FRIENDS OTHER FISHERMEN SAW THE PILOT WAVE AS HE FLEW BY. SEVERAL WITNESSES REPORTED THAT THE PILOT WAS AT OR BELOW TREE LEVEL AS HE FLEW BACK OVER THE FROZEN LAKE. HE WAS OBSERVED TO TURN TOWARD TALL TREES AT THE SHORELINE, THEN PULL UP AS IF TO CLIMB OVER THE TREES. SUDDENLY, THE NOSE DROPPED AND THE PLANE IMPACTED ON THE ICE. THE WITNESSES REPORTED THAT THE ENGINE SEEMED TO OPERATE NORMALLY UNTIL IMPACT. A CANVAS POUCH WITH MARIJUANA, HASHISH, AND COCAINE WAS FOUND IN THE PILOT'S COAT POCKET. A TOXICOLOGICAL TEST OF THE PILOT'S BLOOD REVEALED .042 PER CENT ALCOHOL BUT NO DRUGS. THIS TEST WOULD NOT HAVE IDENTIFIED MARIJUANA.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC82FNC04
- Event ID
- 20020917X02566
- Case number
- NYC82FNC04
- 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: 57935e63fe8c16a71eb18a10d4dccaf121ccc0de25789f0257f1bc9fe8898d85; retrieved 2026-09-21T08:37:13.336Z.