LAX04LA079 · Bellanca 7ECA
Bellanca 7ECA · Accident: airframe, component or system failure during landing
From Santa Paula Airport (SZP) to Oxnard Airport (KOXR)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX04LA079
- 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
- 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
Bellanca 7ECA
- Aircraft type
- Bellanca 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
- N53879
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Santa Paula Airport (SZP), Santa Paula, CATo Oxnard Airport (KOXR), Oxnard, CA
- 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 · landing roll
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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
- Flt control syst, rudder control › Failure, total
- Manufacturer › Procedure inadequate
- Miscellaneous, dowel/pin › Failure, total
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, installation, incorrect
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane ground looped during the landing roll. After touchdown, the pilot applied right rudder and the pedal became stuck in a near full forward position. The pilot was then unable to maintain directional control and the airplane turned approximately 270 degrees on the runway and came to rest. A post accident inspection revealed that the pin that secured the right rudder pedal to the brake cylinder arm was missing. There was also evidence of aluminum shavings at the pin attachment point. An identical problem was discovered by the operator on the sister ship to the accident airplane. The pin on the sister ship was changed a few weeks before the accident. The operator intended to examine the rudder pedal pins on the accident airplane in the next scheduled maintenance period. The manufacturer of the airplane indicated that the pin can be installed either outboard or inboard of the cotter key. As depicted in Figure 26 of the Parts Manual, the installation of the pin is depicted as inboard of the cotter key. In this model of the airplane, the battery is located in the forward section of the fuselage and a structural angle brace is installed for support. On the right pedal of the forward seat, the clearance between the pin and the angle brace is reduced with the angle brace in the design location if the pin is installed inboard of the cotter key. If the pin is installed outboard of the cotter key, it allows for greater clearance between the pin and the angle brace.
Probable cause
the failure of the pin that secured the right rudder pedal to the brake cylinder arm due to improper installation of the pin. Also causal was the manufacturer's confusing maintenance instructions regarding the installation of the right rudder pedal pin and cotter key.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX04LA079
- Event ID
- 20031230X02102
- Case number
- LAX04LA079
- 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: 97187edc451eeb4d2e776c9e143612b2ce453a644abc195a69ad192c84341927; retrieved 2026-09-22T08:03:15.691Z.