CHI06LA012 · Bellanca 7GCBC
Bellanca 7GCBC · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From Roseau, MN to Williams, MN (private airstrip)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI06LA012
- 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 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
- N2698Z
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Roseau, MNTo Williams, MN (private airstrip)
- 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
- Approach
- 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, inadequate
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 contacted the water following a loss of control in flight. The pilot reported he was flying over a friend's cabin when the accident occurred. He reported he flew over the cabin and entered a "standard rate" right turn. He reported they circled 180 degrees and when he tried to level the wings he noticed there was no control pressure on the stick. The pilot reported the right wing dropped and he had limited control of the airplane so he reduced the engine power and added flaps prior to the airplane contacting the water. One witness reported seeing the airplane in a turn prior to it rolling to the right and onto its back. This witness stated the airplane "dove straight in from approx 150 feet." A second witness reported seeing the airplane in a turn with 45 to 60 degrees of bank when it rolled over and descended in a vertical attitude. This witness reported the engine was running and he heard a "pop" sound just prior to the airplane contacting the water. The pilot stated during an interview that the flight controls and engine were operating normally during the flight. He also reported that he did not perform any weight and balance calculations prior to the flight. Weight and balance information indicates the airplane was at least 242 pounds over the maximum gross weight.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain airspeed which resulted in the airplane stalling. Factors associated with the accident were the low level at which the airplane was maneuvering and the pilot's failure to perform weight and balance calculations prior to the accident.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI06LA012
- Event ID
- 20051018X01674
- Case number
- CHI06LA012
- 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: c4a7cdc20fb861cf1c861813bfbd41a04f6baf027ad806a55c0f65f3282acb79; retrieved 2026-09-21T09:02:19.675Z.