DFW06CA189 · Piper PA19/L-18C
Piper PA19/L-18C · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From O07 to O07
Event
- NTSB case
- DFW06CA189
- 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
Piper PA19/L-18C
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA19
- 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
- N3134F
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From O07To O07
- 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/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, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Stall/spin, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The 2,486-hour commercial pilot lost control of the single-engine airplane while maneuvering at low airspeed over a hot-air balloon that landed approximately 500 yards south of a grass-strip runway. The airport owner, who observed the airplane prior to the accident, stated that the pilot was performing touch and go landings at the airport, where there were hot-air balloon operations in the vicinity. He added that he observed the accident airplane perform a couple of low passes in the area where a balloon had landed. The wreckage of the airplane was found approximately one mile south of the airport. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) inspector, who responded to the accident site, reported that the tricycle gear airplane was found in a right wing low, nose down attitude, which he stated was consistent with ground impact as a result of a stall/spin mishap. He added that the left wing was bent forward, and the right main landing gear was folded under the fuselage. He added that fuel was present in the fuel tank; however, there was no post-impact fire. The wind was reported from 270 degrees at 6 knots at the time of the accident.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain adequate airspeed while maneuvering resulting in an inadvertent stall/spin.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DFW06CA189
- Event ID
- 20060810X01151
- Case number
- DFW06CA189
- 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: 6b3386ebd1c86517a2342f5b0c26d7ecf02c93fff8f2c1acc134704d9c7a3cd5; retrieved 2026-09-21T08:55:19.093Z.