LAX08FA122 · Carlton M. Cadwell Lancair IV-P
Boehle Aviation Carlton M. Cadwell Lancair IV-P · Accident: aerodynamic stall/spin during initial climb
From Falcon Field (FFZ) to John Wayne Orange County International Airport (SNA)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX08FA122
- 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
- 3 · 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
Carlton M. Cadwell Lancair IV-P
- Aircraft type
- Carlton M Cadwell LANCAIR IV-P
- 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
- N25CL
- Operator
- Boehle Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Falcon Field (FFZ), Mesa, AZTo John Wayne Orange County International Airport (SNA), Santa Ana, CA
- 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
- Defining eventThe 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
- Aerodynamic 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Air traffic controllers reported that shortly after takeoff, about the time the landing gear was being retracted, they observed smoke trailing from the airplane. The controller advised the pilot of the smoke, but did not receive a response. Additional witnesses reported that the airplane made an abrupt climbing left turn with the wings rocking back and forth before it nosed down and descended in a near-vertical attitude to ground impact. All flight control surfaces were accounted for at the accident site and all airplane components were found in the immediate area of the impact location. Due to fire and thermal damage to the majority of the composite airframe structure, establishment of control continuity was not possible. Teardown inspection of the engine did not disclose any evidence of a mechanical failure or malfunction. Investigators were unable to determine the cause or origin of the reported smoke during departure.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain an adequate airspeed during climb out resulting in an aerodynamic stall/spin.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX08FA122
- Event ID
- 20080428X00559
- Case number
- LAX08FA122
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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: ffdf30ffe5304a9767428bc8d823fa3819824db25157ada6e7b49d217c052ae7; retrieved 2026-09-13T19:03:03.751Z.