Branch River Air Service de Havilland DHC-2 accident
de Havilland DHC-2 · Accident: collision during takeoff/landing
From an unrecorded airport to King Salmon Airport (PAKN)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC22LA078
- 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
- Event fatalities
- Unknown
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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
de Havilland DHC-2
- Aircraft type
- de Havilland DHC-2
- 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
- N24BR
- Operator
- Branch River Air Service
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo King Salmon Airport (PAKN), King Salmon, AK
- Aircraft age
- About 69 years (built 1953)
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- Takeoff
- 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
- Collision during takeoff/landing
- 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
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was departing from a lake in a float-equipped airplane with passengers and hunting gear. He stated that the departure plan was to get the airplane on step into the wind, and then turn lengthwise and depart with a crosswind. During the takeoff run, the airplane “used a fair amount of water on step” before a gust of wind lifted the right wing. In an effort to correct for the gust, the pilot lowered the wing and added power, but the airplane was too close to the bank of the lake, which resulted in an impact with terrain and substantial damage to the fuselage, right wing and tail. The pilot reported no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation. In the recommendation section of NTSB Form 6120.1, the pilot stated that a step turn departure may have been more appropriate.
Probable cause
The pilot’s loss of control during takeoff in gusting wind conditions.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC22LA078
- Event ID
- 20220920105976
- Case number
- ANC22LA078
- 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, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2022-09-19.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 8a32a3d3b296b5c9e726e669ee89da921f08bd6cc7523aef1ebb11786fda4c51; retrieved 2026-09-16T16:04:32.912Z.