CHI08LA031 · WRB Associates, LLC. Zodiac 601 XL
WRB Associates, LLC. Zodiac 601 XL · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From Sharpe Farms Airport (MO09) to Sharpe Farms Airport (MO09)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI08LA031
- 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
WRB Associates, LLC. Zodiac 601 XL
- Aircraft type
- WRB Associates ZODIAC 601
- 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
- N634WB
- Operator
- Stevens Lee Walker
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sharpe Farms Airport (MO09), Lewistown, MOTo Sharpe Farms Airport (MO09), Lewistown, MO
- 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
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, not maintained
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 was certified as an Experimental Light Sport Aircraft (E-LSA) four days before the accident. The accident occurred during the airplane's first flight since manufacture. Several witnesses reported seeing the airplane depart and then commence a series of left turns about two miles southeast of the airport. While the airplane was established in a left turn it rolled to the left and entered a near vertical descent. The airplane exploded upon impact and a ground fire ensued. The wreckage was found in a vacant field with no obstructions in the general area of the accident site. The absence of any discernible lateral ground markings was consistent with a near vertical impact. Examination of the recovered wreckage revealed no evidence of a pre-impact mechanical malfunction. The pilot did not have any flight experience in a model 601 XL airplane before the accident flight. The pilot's most current flight review was completed more than 16 years before the accident. According to the pilot's wife, it had been nearly 10 years since he last piloted an aircraft.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain aircraft control while maneuvering. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's lack of recent flight experience and his total lack of experience in the accident airplane model.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI08LA031
- Event ID
- 20071108X01767
- Case number
- CHI08LA031
- 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: bb7148e13e1dcc523b0a24d37e66df427a05af2465d6c6db6b746715ddc9d1a1; retrieved 2026-09-20T16:08:50.592Z.