WPR25LA016 · Lindstrand 80E
Lindstrand 80E · Accident: landing area overshoot
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR25LA016
- 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
- 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
Lindstrand 80E
- Aircraft type
- Lindstrand 80
- Category
- Balloon
- 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
- N80029
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 2 years (built 2022)
- 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
- Landing
- 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
- Landing area overshoot
- 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 from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he was attempting to land a hot air balloon in a field, when the wind shifted. Upon touchdown, one of the passengers exited without the pilot’s instruction to do so. As a result of the passenger exiting, the balloon suddenly climbed about 15-20 ft. Subsequently, as the balloon was descending to the ground, the pilot vented out the remaining air from the envelope, which then contacted the ground and a powerline. A spark was observed at the powerline and a small fire ensued, which resulted in substantial damage to the envelope. The pilot reported that the balloon had no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation. The pilot further stated that a preflight passenger briefing was conducted prior to the flight, which directed passengers to remain in the basket until the pilot gives permission to exit.
Probable cause
The pilot’s loss of control during landing, which resulted in the balloon’s envelope contacting powerlines.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR25LA016
- Event ID
- 20241015195319
- Case number
- WPR25LA016
- 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: 708a9c4c8898b2440be3ba81f571fc229dff80053a5181ee6de787d1a43fdabb; retrieved 2026-09-16T19:23:04.383Z.