WPR11CA157 · Aeronca 7EC
Aeronca 7EC · Accident: part(s) separation from aircraft during takeoff
From Big Bear City Airport (L35) to Big Bear City Airport (L35)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR11CA157
- 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
Aeronca 7EC
- Aircraft type
- Aeronca 7
- 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
- N2349E
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Big Bear City Airport (L35), Big Bear City, CATo Big Bear City Airport (L35), Big Bear City, 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
- Takeoff
- 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
- Part(s) separation from aircraft
- 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 handling/service
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that prior to takeoff, he removed the left main landing gear wheel because its tire had a slow air leak. The pilot, who held a Federal Aviation Administration issued airframe and powerplant mechanic certificate, replaced the tube and reinstalled the wheel. He indicated that when performing this maintenance, he did not properly secure the wheel’s retaining nut with a cotter pin. During the takeoff roll, the attachment nut unscrewed and the wheel separated from the axle and airplane. The pilot flew around the area for about 30 minutes in an effort to burn off fuel. Upon landing, the airplane veered left off the runway and nosed over, breaking wing ribs and a lift strut.
Probable cause
The pilot's improper maintenance, which resulted in a wheel separating from the airplane during takeoff, and the airplane's subsequent nose over during the landing rollout.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR11CA157
- Event ID
- 20110310X20826
- Case number
- WPR11CA157
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2011-03-11.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 1616525f0355447d2443225f1c11a69d72ad7919cc6c7253442f5d2237c4f80c; retrieved 2026-09-15T15:53:47.408Z.