FLIGHT FINDINGSAVIATION OCCURRENCE MAP
Back to map

CEN11CA139 · Cessna 305A

25 Dec 2010 · Spooner, WI, United States

Cessna 305A · Accident: collision with terrain/object (non-CFIT) during landing

From Spooner, WI (private airstrip) to Spooner, WI

Report a problem

Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's departure or destination. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.

Event

NTSB case
CEN11CA139
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

Cessna 305A

Aircraft type
Cessna 305
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
N6897
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route Narrative disagrees
From Spooner, WI (private airstrip)To Spooner, WI
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
Landing · landing roll
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
Collision with terrain/object (non-CFIT)
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

  • Environmental issues › Physical environment
  • Personnel issues › Action/decision

Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

The pilot reported that prior to landing, he performed two low level passes to determine a safe landing area on the frozen lake. He said that during the landing, the left landing gear ski touched down and he heard a bang as the left ski impacted a snow-covered raised ice ridge. He slowed the airplane for the landing rollout and the airplane came to rest upright. A postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that the landing gear box structure was bent and the bulkheads were damaged. The examination did not disclose any evidence of a mechanical malfunction. The pilot reported that he should have landed the airplane in the middle of lake which likely would have had less slush and rough ice.

Probable cause

The pilot's selection of unsuitable terrain for landing on a snow-covered lake.

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record CEN11CA139
Event ID
20110104X02701
Case number
CEN11CA139
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: 218b5deb8b32f5bd768dcc54b4289cffe88d4facff4c3c748a979ed234f63dfa; retrieved 2026-09-15T15:39:40.796Z.