MIA82DA149 · Aeronca Champion 7AC
Sunshine Flight Aeronca Champion 7AC · Accident: hard landing
From Albert Whitted Airport (SPG) to Albert Whitted Airport (SPG)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA82DA149
- 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
Aeronca Champion 7AC
- Aircraft type
- Aeronca Champion 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
- N1724E
- Operator
- Sunshine Flight
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Albert Whitted Airport (SPG), St. Petersburg, FLTo Albert Whitted Airport (SPG), St. Petersburg, FL
- 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 · flare/touchdown
- 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
- Hard landing
- 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 › Compensation for wind conditions, improper
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
WHEN THE PILOT TOOKOFF TO PRACTICE TOUCH AND GO LANDINGS, HE NOTICED A STORM ACROSS THE BAY OVER TAMPA. HE CHANGED FROM RUNWAY 24 TO RUNWAY 18 WHEN HE NOTICED A CHANGE IN THE WIND DIRECTION. AFTER COMPLETING THREE MORE TOUCH AND GO LANDINGS, HE ELECTED TO MAKE THE NEXT TO A FULL STOP. HE REPORTED THAT THE APPROACH SEEMED TO BE SATISFACTORY UNTIL HE BEGAN TO FLARE. AT THAT TIME, THE PLANE SUDDENLY BEGAN DRIFTING RIGHT. THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE TRIED TO CORRECT FOR THE DRIFT, BUT THE PLANE STALLED AND STRUCK THE GROUND. BOTH OF THE MAIN GEAR FAILED DURING TOUCHDOWN. THE PILOT ESTIMATED THE WIND WAS GUSTING TO 20 KNOTS. ACCORDING TO THE 1549 EDT WEATHER OBSERVATION AT ST. PETERSBURG, THERE WAS INTENSIVE THUNDERSTORM ACTIVITY IN THE AREA.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA82DA149
- Event ID
- 20020917X03756
- Case number
- MIA82DA149
- 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: 4443f3f81bf07190e802920db946513488079c912443da712ea2469970fe64a4; retrieved 2026-09-24T02:32:27.945Z.