WPR09CA256 · Westerhout/Gagnier Escapade
Westerhout/Gagnier Escapade · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From Healdsburg Municipal Airport (O31) to Healdsburg Municipal Airport (O31)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR09CA256
- 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
Westerhout/Gagnier Escapade
- Aircraft type
- Westerhout/gagnier ESCAPADE
- 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
- N29DY
- Operator
- Daniel York
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Healdsburg Municipal Airport (O31), Healdsburg, CATo Healdsburg Municipal Airport (O31), Healdsburg, 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
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Environmental issues › Conditions/weather/phenomena
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot said he had completed an uneventful flight earlier in the day. On the accident flight, he performed an engine run-up, which included a magneto check with no mechanical anomalies encountered. He taxied to the active runway (runway 13), and noted the winds were light about 5 knots from the south. The takeoff roll was normal, and they lifted off at 50 mph. After rotation, the airplane started a left bank for no apparent reason. The pilot did not pull back on the control stick; however, he attempted to align the airplane with the runway. He noted that the airplane did not respond to his roll input and continued in the left bank. The pilot also stated that the airplane had started a slight climb just prior to impacting the vineyard. After the initial contact with the vineyard, the airplane became airborne again and then dropped back into the vineyard. The pilot stated that there were no mechanical problems with the airplane and he believes that the winds may have shifted to more of a south wind at the time of the loss of control event. Reported winds at the time were from 140 degrees at 5 knots.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate compensation for the crosswind condition and failure to maintain directional/lateral control during the initial climb.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR09CA256
- Event ID
- 20090522X81451
- Case number
- WPR09CA256
- 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: 685a7e856a4bda1ed91a3f1fe7d11211c4f670a233f8dba6320842095c991fdf; retrieved 2026-09-15T11:08:57.679Z.