MIA07CA061 · Bruce E. Hotz Wind Wagon
Bruce E. Hotz Wind Wagon · Accident: partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Leesburg International Airport (KLEE) to Leesburg International Airport (KLEE)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA07CA061
- 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
Bruce E. Hotz Wind Wagon
- Aircraft type
- Bruce E Hotz WIND WAGON
- 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
- N9017M
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Leesburg International Airport (KLEE), Leesburg, FLTo Leesburg International Airport (KLEE), Leesburg, FL
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical)
- 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 › Aborted takeoff, not performed
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The installed engine/propeller combination did not produce the intended rpm after becoming airborne during the flight test flight, but the pilot continued the takeoff. During the initial climb when approximately 3/4 down the runway, the flight encountered turbulence, and coupled with reduced performance, resulted in failure to maintain a positive rate of climb. The pilot lowered the nose of the airplane in an effort to avoid a stall but the airplane collided with a concrete berm near the departure end of the runway. The airplane then impacted the ground adjacent to a 4-lane highway, and the airplane and a vehicle on the road collided. The pilot reported there was no preimpact mechanical failure or malfunction of the engine, flight controls, or systems.
Probable cause
The failure of the pilot to abort the takeoff after recognizing that the engine rpm was 760 less than desired after becoming airborne, and the inability of the airplane to maintain a positive rate of climb resulting in a controlled descent, and in-flight collision with a concrete blast type fence. A factor in the accident was the in-flight encounter with turbulence.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA07CA061
- Event ID
- 20070525X00637
- Case number
- MIA07CA061
- 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: b19385cccab998b6d952082a7a741a8a9645e2f1216d5652bced46a5d17e6dd5; retrieved 2026-09-21T18:33:47.087Z.