CEN22LA152 · Bellanca 17-30A
Bellanca 17-30A · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From Ozark Regional Airport (KBPK) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN22LA152
- 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
Bellanca 17-30A
- Aircraft type
- Bellanca 17
- 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
- N8869V
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ozark Regional Airport (KBPK), Mountain Home, ARTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 51 years (built 1971)
- 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
- Approach · VFR go-around
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
- Personnel issues › Experience/knowledge
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The 80-hour pilot reported that, while attempting to land in gusty wind conditions, the wind suddenly became “super gusty” as the airplane flew over the runway numbers. The pilot performed a go-around; however, when he added throttle, the engine lost all power and due to the low altitude, he was unable to perform an engine restart. He performed a forced landing near the runway but lost control of the airplane and impacted terrain. The engine was examined, and no anomalies were detected. The left magneto could not be tested due to being waterlogged due to outside storage of the engine before the examination. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) sound spectrum analysis determined that the engine was operating around 1,700 rpm at the time of impact. The airplane’s EDM-900 was downloaded, and the information plotted. The data was not time coded but did show a sharp reduction of horsepower, exhaust gas temperatures, fuel flow, and RPM, that restored briefly before dropping off, likely due to the accident. The video recovered from the accident airplane showed the airplane approaching the runway; after crossing the runway threshold, the airplane floated. There was a slight increase in engine power, and the stall warning horn sounded briefly. The airplane continued to float, and the nose of the airplane pitched up and the stall warning horn was briefly heard again. As the pitch angle continued to increase, the stall warning horn was heard. The engine rpm decreased and popping sounds consistent with a rough running engine were noted. A few seconds later the popping noises ceased, and the engine rpm returned to a higher power setting. The pitch angle continued to increase, and the stall warning was audible. The pilot lost control of the airplane as it entered a stall and impacted terrain. The sound spectrum analysis indicated that the engine ran rough for about 6 seconds, and then the engine rpm was heard increasing to about 2,100 rpm about 9 seconds before it gradually decreased to 1,700 rpm at impact. The reason for the partial loss of engine power could not be determined.
Probable cause
The partial loss of engine power during a go-around resulting in an inadvertent entry into an aerodynamic stall. Contributing to the accident was the inexperience of the low-time pilot.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN22LA152
- Event ID
- 20220326104829
- Case number
- CEN22LA152
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Source notes (5)
- 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, coordinates, cause areas. 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: 6a801004a180f367edf47b460ba57bad759b9acb72f50bff23b9f7667fa30928; retrieved 2026-09-16T15:03:52.787Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: departure. Transposed identifier; Ozark Regional at Mountain Home, AR is KBPK.