ERA13LA015 · VELLINE'S BREEZY RLU-1
Addison Aviation VELLINE'S BREEZY RLU-1 · Accident: aerodynamic stall/spin during initial climb
From Madison Municipal Airport (52A) to Madison Municipal Airport (52A)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA13LA015
- 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
VELLINE'S BREEZY RLU-1
- Aircraft type
- Velline's BREEZY RLU-1
- 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
- N255JL
- Operator
- Addison Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Madison Municipal Airport (52A), Madison, GATo Madison Municipal Airport (52A), Madison, GA
- 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
- Aerodynamic stall/spin
- 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
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Before takeoff, a witness observed the pilot performing a preflight inspection, during which the pilot appeared to check the fuel system for contaminants. The airplane subsequently departed and was observed to climb to between 150 and 200 feet above ground level before a witness heard a loud “bang” and noted black smoke trailing from the airplane. Additionally, several witnesses reported that the engine was “running rough.” The airplane continued to fly about the same altitude with the engine sputtering and running rough, emitting puffs of black smoke every 1 to 2 seconds. Several witnesses indicated that before the airplane flew past the departure end of the runway, it stalled, entered a spin, and impacted terrain.
Postaccident examination of the engine revealed crankshaft, camshaft and valve train continuity. Examination of the ignition system revealed no discrepancies. The carburetor was removed and bench tested, which revealed that it produced a richer-than-specified fuel/air mixture at several throttle positions, including full throttle, which would be used for takeoff. However, it is unlikely that the overly rich fuel/air mixture caused the symptoms reported by the witnesses. Although weather conditions at the time of the accident were conducive to serious carburetor icing at glide power, the airplane was not operating at glide power during the accident takeoff. The investigation was unable to determine the cause of the power loss.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to maintain airspeed following a loss of engine power during takeoff for reasons that could not be determined because postaccident examination did not reveal any anomalies that would have precluded normal operation, and the airplane’s subsequent aerodynamic stall.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA13LA015
- Event ID
- 20121010X95226
- Case number
- ERA13LA015
- 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: 0c823481303cfaced85cc5abc60d817b24099532fcaeaa55cf65f2140465c06b; retrieved 2026-09-15T20:08:19.296Z.