LAX05LA204 · Bellanca 7GCBC
Bellanca 7GCBC · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From Carson Airport (CXP) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX05LA204
- 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
Bellanca 7GCBC
- 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
- N8634
- Operator
- Jeffrey D. Zajicek · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Carson Airport (CXP), Carson City, NVTo 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Stall, encountered
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 stalled and descended to ground impact while turning in high wind conditions close to the ground. One witness said that the airplane was flying directly into the strong winds that were out of the southwest at 25 to 30 knots. He believed the airplane's ground speed was in the 40-knot range as it appeared to be following a road at about 200 feet above ground level (agl). The airplane began a left turn with a gentle bank that increased slowly to around 45 degrees of bank. As the aircraft reached about 100 degrees of turn, it started to drop. As the turn continued, the aircraft's tail began yawing back and forth as the right wing continued to drop. The aircraft then descended into the trees at a 45-degree nose down attitude. Based on temperatures, elevations, and station pressures of nearby weather reporting facilities, the density altitude was computed to be around 7,300 feet. Examination of the wreckage by FAA inspectors found no evidence of preimpact mechanical malfunction or failure with the airframe or engine.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to maintain an adequate airspeed while turning in strong wind conditions, which resulted in a stall/spin. A factor in the accident was the high density altitude.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX05LA204
- Event ID
- 20050708X00969
- Case number
- LAX05LA204
- 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: b13762d884eeda13a94521877359acdaf1b291c8e9da9254eb231c4de21bcdbf; retrieved 2026-09-20T18:01:31.372Z.