ERA12FA345 · Shepard Jimmy D JR PITTS S1D
Shepard Jimmy D JR PITTS S1D · Accident: low altitude operation/event while maneuvering
From Hidden Lake Airport (FA40) to Hidden Lake Airport (FA40)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA12FA345
- 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
- 1 · 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
Shepard Jimmy D JR PITTS S1D
- Aircraft type
- Shepard Jimmy D JR PITTS S1D
- 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
- N360MW
- Operator
- John P. Donnenfield · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Hidden Lake Airport (FA40), New Port Richey East, FLTo Hidden Lake Airport (FA40), New Port Richey East, FL
- 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 · aerobatics
- 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
- Low altitude operation/event
- 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 › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Several witnesses reported that the pilot was conducting aerobatic maneuvers over the Gulf of Mexico. The airplane initiated a loop between 300 to 500 feet above the water. At the top of the loop, while inverted, the airplane started the descent; however, the airplane was too low to recover. The airplane collided with the water in a nose-down, left-wing-low attitude. There was no noticeable change in engine noise during the accident sequence. Examination of the airframe, flight controls, engine assembly and accessories revealed no anomalies.
According to the pilot’s wife, for the 4 days leading up to the accident, the pilot had symptoms of a cold and was prescribed Amoxicillin, an antibiotic which treats infections.On the day of the accident, the pilot did not complain of or was not known to have any issues with light headedness or dizziness. Based on this information the pilot did not appear to have a medical condition that would have contributed to the accident and witness accounts indicated the pilot was maneuvering the airplane until impact with the water.
According to the operating rules section of 14 Code of Federal Regustions Part 91, which defines the restrictions on aerobatics, no person may operate an aircraft in aerobatic flight below an altitude of 1,500 feet above the surface.
Probable cause
The pilot's decision to conduct aerobatic flight at a low altitude, which resulted in a collision with the water.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA12FA345
- Event ID
- 20120521X35247
- Case number
- ERA12FA345
- 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: ba49ad93b7372daed36717c3ac8e0936c61ac1b4a6e57d2e761cec414706fc93; retrieved 2026-09-13T22:23:29.915Z.