CEN16FA346 · Bellanca 7ECA
Bellanca 7ECA · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From Cleveland Municipal Airport (6R3) to Cleveland Municipal Airport (6R3)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN16FA346
- 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
- 2 · 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
Bellanca 7ECA
- Aircraft type
- Bellanca 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
- N787MW
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Cleveland Municipal Airport (6R3), Cleveland, TXTo Cleveland Municipal Airport (6R3), Cleveland, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 40 years (built 1976)
- 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
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The private pilot and a passenger were conducting a local flight and performing aerobatics. Witnesses observed the pilot conducting "flybys" and "tricks" in the area. One witness reported observing the airplane complete "flips and spins" for about 10 minutes before the accident. Ground-based video footage depicted the airplane flying over the river at low altitude. The airplane pitched up and entered a steep climb. As the airplane reached the top of the climb, it yawed to the left and entered a near- vertical descent and gradual left turn. Shortly before impacting the river, the gradual left turn reversed abruptly into a right, descending turn. The airplane then impacted the river. A post-accident examination of the airframe and engine did not reveal any anomalies consistent with a pre-impact failure or malfunction.
According to a friend, the pilot was competent in spins and had received instruction in aerobatic maneuvers. However, the lack of a formal logbook training record with respect to aerobatics, the investigation could not determine the pilot's level of proficiency in such maneuvers.
Toxicological testing on the pilot was positive for cocaine and its metabolites; cocaethylene, a metabolite formed when cocaine is ingested with alcohol; and levamisole, a drug commonly used to "cut" street cocaine, in urine. Cavity blood was positive for methamphetamine and its metabolites. The absence of cocaine in the pilot's blood suggested distant usage. Accordingly, the acute effects of the drug had likely dissipated. The level of methamphetamine in the pilot's blood sample was low. As a result, the presence of any residual effects of the drug could not be determined. Based on the available information, the investigation was unable to determine whether the pilot was impaired, if at all, at the time of the accident.
Probable cause
The pilot's loss of control attempting to recover from a low-level aerobatic maneuver. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's decision to attempt the low-level maneuver which significantly reduced any margin for error.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN16FA346
- Event ID
- 20160903X32500
- Case number
- CEN16FA346
- 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 2016-09-04.
- API snapshot SHA-256: f6d2b85760596b14a15e3bff1fde1beae6cd7b90d110caa8fcd2b9f87d883590; retrieved 2026-09-14T21:59:32.454Z.