ERA12CA272 · Wielt GREAT LAKES 2T-1A
Wielt GREAT LAKES 2T-1A · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From Old Orchard Airpark (2NK9) to Old Orchard Airpark (2NK9)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's location. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA12CA272
- 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
Wielt GREAT LAKES 2T-1A
- Aircraft type
- Wielt GREAT LAKES 2T-1A
- 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
- N211RW
- Operator
- Thomas Mark R
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Old Orchard Airpark (2NK9), Modena, NYTo Old Orchard Airpark (2NK9), Modena, NY
- 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
- Maneuvering · low-altitude flying
- 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
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot stated that he performed a preflight inspection of the airplane with no anomalies noted. The purpose of the flight was to circle over a friend's property and return to the departure airport. The pilot said that, as he began the first turn to circle the property, he waved to his friends on the ground; he did not recall anything after he initiated that turn. According to a witness, as the airplane began to turn, it lost altitude and descended at a 45-degree angle until it struck a tree and then the ground. The airplane incurred substantial damage to the wings and fuselage during the accident sequence. The pilot reported that there were no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to maintain airplane control during low level maneuvering flight.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA12CA272
- Event ID
- 20120409X91540
- Case number
- ERA12CA272
- 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: 17af6cf60cfad17a81305e0be03796b7358854c428c3870b9f99605ecfb053d0; retrieved 2026-09-15T17:42:52.606Z.