SEA03FA096 · Aviat A-1A
Aviat A-1A · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water while maneuvering
From Sandpoint Airport (SZT) to Sandpoint, ID
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA03FA096
- 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
- Unknown
- 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
Aviat A-1A
- Aircraft type
- Aviat A-1
- 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
- N141F
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sandpoint Airport (SZT), Sandpoint, IDTo Sandpoint, ID
- 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
- In flight collision with terrain/water
- 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
- Pilot in command › Airspeed(vs), not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
After takeoff, the pilot headed to an area near a pond where a group of people had gathered. He then flew over the group of individuals three times, during each of which the passenger dropped candy to the group below. After he passed over the pond the third time, the pilot continued toward the south over an open field. When he was about one-half way down the field, he made a left descending turn, and then flew north about 300 feet from the east edge of the field, where a pickup truck was proceeding north toward the pond. The aircraft flew past the pickup at a very slow airspeed, while about 40 to 50 feet above the ground. As the aircraft flew past the truck, the passenger waved to friends that were riding in it. After passing by the truck, the pilot continued to the north at the same height. As the aircraft approached the approximately 75 feet high trees at the north end of the field, the pilot banked slightly to the left, pulled the nose up, and increased the engine power significantly. The aircraft then stalled, rolled to the right, and impacted the ground in a nose-down attitude. There was no evidence of any engine or flight control abnormalities or anomalies that would have resulted in an engine malfunction or an uncommanded flight control movement.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain adequate airspeed during a low pass maneuver which resulted in a stall. A related factor was the trees.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA03FA096
- Event ID
- 20030620X00923
- Case number
- SEA03FA096
- 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, coordinates. 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: 31ffbb13c79e3f1b472286ed50158aa447628b3b715f32e7224d0bbc6631ec51; retrieved 2026-09-20T19:11:39.608Z.