2021 Tennessee Cessna Citation crash
JL&GL Productions LP Cessna 501 CITATION · Loss of control during climb
From Smyrna Airport (MQY) to President Donald J. Trump International Airport (PBI)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA21FA234
- 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
- 7 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- Occupants
- 7
- Survivors
- 0
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 0 serious · 0 minor (NTSB)
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Cessna 501 CITATION
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 501
- 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
- N66BK
- Operator
- JL&GL Productions LP
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Smyrna Airport (MQY), Smyrna, TNTo President Donald J. Trump International Airport (PBI), West Palm Beach, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 39 years (built 1982)
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Personnel issues › Psychological
- 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.
From the Wikipedia article
On 29 May 2021, a Cessna 501 Citation I/SP crashed into the Percy Priest Lake in Tennessee, United States shortly after takeoff from Smyrna Airport (MQY) in Smyrna, Tennessee. All seven occupants died, including Remnant Fellowship Church founder Gwen Shamblin Lara and her husband, actor Joe Lara, who was piloting the aircraft.
Accident
The aircraft took off from Smyrna Airport in Smyrna, Tennessee, at 10:53 a.m. for a planned Federal Aviation Regulations Part 91 personal flight to Palm Beach International Airport. After takeoff, the aircraft started a right turn and climbed to an altitude of 2900 ft before descending to 1800 ft, climbing again to 3000 ft, and then descending into the lake, two minutes and one second after departure.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) stated that seven people were on board.
Witnesses on the lake reported that the aircraft impacted the water near the Fate Sanders Recreation Area. Authorities secured a debris field, and an oil sheen was observed at the site.
At an evening press conference on May 29, Captain Joshua Sanders of the Rutherford County Fire Department stated that, after search operations on the lake since 11:00 a.m., the response had shifted from rescue to recovery.
Dive teams from Rutherford County Fire & Rescue, the Metro Nashville Office of Emergency Management, the Metro Nashville Police Department, and the Wilson County Emergency Management Agency recovered several components of the aircraft and human remains.
In addition to water-based operations, authorities operated drones to search for debris that might have drifted from the crash site.
Drone operations continued over the debris field, and air traffic was restricted within a 1-nautical-mile (1.9 km) radius of the site up to 500 ft altitude.
Retired FAA inspector Larry Williams stated that the event occurred too quickly for the pilot to issue a distress call.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
By 1 June 2021, searchers had recovered both aircraft engines, a significant portion of the fuselage, and unidentified human remains. Authorities had named the seven victims, all of whom were leaders at the Remnant Fellowship Church.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) deployed a lead investigator to the site on May 30, 2021, and assumed responsibility for the investigation. The Federal Aviation Administration and local authorities assisted. The NTSB also engaged Cessna and other parties to support the investigation.
Media reports identified Joe Lara and another occupant as pilots. According to FAA certification records cited by USA Today, Lara’s medical certificate had expired and the other man did not hold the required type rating for the Citation I.
On June 1, Remnant Fellowship Church presented an apparent valid medical certificate for Lara to the FAA. The aviation medical examiner named on the certificate declined to confirm its authenticity and referred inquiries to the FAA, which stated that its medical-certificate database is current and “generally accurate” and deferred further questions to the NTSB.
Aviation International News reported that Lara held a valid medical certificate and that both pilots possessed multi-engine and instrument ratings.
On 22 March 2023, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined that the cause of the accident was "the pilot's loss of airplane control during climb due to spatial disorientation." Flight tracking data revealed that after takeoff, the aircraft entered clouds at 1,300 ft (400m) and made a series of heading changes, along with several climbs and descents, before it entered a steep, descending left turn. Accelerations associated with the airplane’s increasing airspeed were likely perceived by the pilot as the airplane pitching up although it was in a continuous descent. This occurred because Lara was experiencing a type of spatial disorientation, a somatogravic illusion, and he probably did not effectively use his instruments during takeoff and climb. As a result, Lara most likely experienced a high workload managing the flight profile, which would have had a negative effect on his performance. As such, the airplane entered a high acceleration, unusual attitude, descending left turn from which he was not able to recover.
The NTSB investigation reviewed Lara's pilot training in the CE-500-type aircraft and reported that at the end of a 12-day series of training sessions at a flight school in January 2020, "the pilot did not meet the requisite performance level to attempt the CE-500 type rating check ride." Lara returned to his local instructor for more training and subsequently passed his check ride. Nonetheless, a pilot who flew in the accident aircraft with Lara on several occasions judged him to be "weak" when flying in instrument meteorological conditions.
Text from the Wikipedia article “2021 Tennessee Cessna Citation crash” (revision 1365262235, retrieved 2026-09-18) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out. Read the article
NTSB narrative
The instrument-rated pilot of the business jet airplane, pilot-rated passenger, and five passengers departed on a cross-country flight and entered the clouds while performing a climbing right turn. The airplane then began to descend, and air traffic control (ATC) asked the pilot to confirm altitude and heading. The pilot did not respond. After a second query from ATC, the pilot acknowledged the instructions. The airplane entered a climbing right turn followed by a left turn. After ATC made several attempts to contact the pilot, the airplane entered a rapid descending left turn and impacted a shallow reservoir at a high rate of speed.
Postaccident examination of the recovered wreckage and both engines revealed no evidence of any preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation.
Flight track data revealed that after takeoff, the airplane entered the clouds and made a series of heading changes, along with several climbs and descents, before it entered a steep, descending left turn. This type of maneuvering was consistent with the onset of a type of spatial disorientation known as somatogravic illusion. According to a National Transportation Safety Board performance study, accelerations associated with the airplane’s increasing airspeed were likely perceived by the pilot as the airplane pitching up although it was in a continuous descent. This occurred because the pilot was experiencing spatial disorientation and he likely did not effectively use his instrumentation during takeoff and climb. As a result of the pilot experiencing spatial disorientation, he likely experienced a high workload managing the flight profile, which would have had a further adverse effect on his performance. As such, the airplane entered a high acceleration, unusual attitude, descending left turn from which the pilot was not able to recover.
The pilot and the pilot-rated passenger did not report any medication use or medical conditions to the Federal Aviation Administration on their recent and only medical certification examinations. Postaccident specimens were insufficient to evaluate the presence of any natural disease during autopsy. However, given the circumstances of this accident, it is unlikely that the pilot’s or pilot-rated passenger’s medical condition were factors in this accident.
Low levels of ethanol were detected in the pilot’s muscle tissue and the pilot-rated passenger’s muscle and kidney tissue; n-butanol was also detected in the pilot’s muscle tissue. Given the length of time to recover the airplane occupants from the water and the circumstances of this accident, it is reasonable that some or all of the identified ethanol in the pilot and the pilot-rated passenger were from sources other than ingestion. Thus, the identified ethanol in the pilot and the pilot-rated passenger did not contribute to this accident.
Probable cause
The pilot’s loss of airplane control during climb due to spatial disorientation.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
Wikipedia article: 2021 Tennessee Cessna Citation crash
- Revision
- 1365262235 · 2026-07-21 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q107272389
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record ERA21FA234
- Event ID
- 20210529103165
- Case number
- ERA21FA234
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "2021 Tennessee Cessna Citation crash" (page 67837882, revision 1365262235); merged with NTSB case ERA21FA234 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- NTSB record ERA21FA234: NTSB narrative opening date, consistent with the API date and time (local date)
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record ERA21FA234
- Map position
- NTSB record ERA21FA234: NTSB API eventLatitude/eventLongitude
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record ERA21FA234: aircraft; gaps from Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- NTSB record ERA21FA234: operated under Part 91: General Aviation
- Fatalities
- NTSB record ERA21FA234: NTSB API totalFatal
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record ERA21FA234: NTSB API ongroundFatal
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (3)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "2021 Tennessee Cessna Citation crash" and NTSB case ERA21FA234, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this US event the NTSB's values are used where the two differ; each value names its source.
- 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.