ERA09CA101 · Steven G Goonen Searey
Steven G Goonen Searey · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From Polkland, FL (no airport) to Polkland, FL (no airport)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA09CA101
- 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
Steven G Goonen Searey
- Aircraft type
- Steven G Goonen SEAREY
- 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
- N628MS
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Polkland, FL (no airport)To Polkland, FL (no airport)
- 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the pilot, he taxied out, verified that the amphibian airplane was configured properly, and completed all checklists. The airplane departed normally from the lake, in a southwest direction. While climbing through about 50 feet above ground level, and approaching a tree line surrounding the lake, the airplane began an uncommanded roll to the right. He then applied full aileron and rudder authority; however, he was unable to control the roll. The airplane continued to roll until it impacted the water. The pilot had approximately 220 hours of flight experience in the accident airplane. Postaccident examination of the airplane by a Federal Aviation Administration inspector revealed no preaccident mechanical problems; the wings and fuselage exhibited signs of impact damage, and flight control continuity was confirmed on all surfaces. Weather observations in the vicinity of the accident site reported winds out of the west and southwest at 10 knots or less. The pilot reported no mechanical malfunction prior to the accident.
Probable cause
A loss of control during the initial climb for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA09CA101
- Event ID
- 20081222X14009
- Case number
- ERA09CA101
- 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. 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: c3fe4dcb026a83c3073949c4c1e63e3d78373b8019ffdf96bd0556dc8edfb678; retrieved 2026-09-15T10:37:28.876Z.