ERA23FA266 · Wonder Michael S HARMON ROCKET
Wonder Michael S HARMON ROCKET · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From an unrecorded airport to N49 · Niagara Falls, NY
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA23FA266
- 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
- 0
- 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
Wonder Michael S HARMON ROCKET
- Aircraft type
- Wonder Michael HARMON ROCKET
- 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
- N85TP
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo N49 · Niagara Falls, NY
- 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 · 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- 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
According to witnesses, the pilot took off and performed a 180° descending turn back toward the airport. He then flew a high-speed, low altitude pass along the runway before pulling up and descending into the trees. One witness reported that the airplane appeared to enter a roll as it descended into the trees near the end of the runway. Postaccident examination of the airframe and engine revealed no evidence of a preimpact mechanical malfunction or failure that would have precluded normal operation. Metallurgical examination of a propeller blade tip that its separation from the propeller blade was likely the result of impact-related damage. Witnesses who knew the pilot and frequently saw him take off stated that after takeoff he typically made a 180° turn, and flew a high-speed low pass over the airport before climbing and entering a barrel roll. The pilot’s routine performance of high-speed flyovers and low-altitude aerobatics was indicative of high-risk behavior. Based on the available information, the pilot likely lost control of the airplane while performing an aerobatic maneuver at an altitude too low to recover.
Probable cause
The pilot’s failure to maintain control of the airplane while initiating a low-altitude aerobatic maneuver, which resulted in impact with trees and terrain. Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s high-risk behavior.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA23FA266
- Event ID
- 20230611192351
- Case number
- ERA23FA266
- 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, 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: ccf83786c5a953165bb9307e580864d83e98f39b3a074eec5957a6537b8713de; retrieved 2026-09-15T08:01:14.667Z.