- Date
- October 19, 2004, 16:50 local (21:50 UTC)
- Place
- Chesterfield, MO
- Injuries
- 1 uninjured
- Damage
- Substantial damage
- Phase of flight
- Landing
- Aircraft
- N558BBeech B-55
- Weather
- Instrument (IMC) · Day
- Status
- Completed · report January 24, 2005
- Report
- Approved by Office Director
- FAA report
- 20041019027279A
- Case key
- 60580
From the NTSB’s public API. By law, NTSB reports can’t be used as evidence in lawsuits over the accident.
On this page
Probable cause
The diverted attention and the inadequate flare by the pilot during landing.
Sequence of events
NTSB’s coding before 2008: each occurrence and phase of flight, and the causes and factors under it. The codes are defined in NTSB’s coding manual.
Analysis
The rental airplane received substantial damage when the nose wheel impacted the runway during landing. The pilot stated the airplane was about 10 feet above the runway when he became distracted from dropping his instrument approach charts.
Factual narrative
On October 19, 2004, at 1650 central daylight time, a Beech 55, N558B, operated by Skyline Aeronautics, LLC, as a rental airplane, received substantial damage when it impacted the runway during a bounced landing on runway 26L (7,485 feet by 150 feet) at Spirit of St. Louis Airport, Chesterfield, Missouri. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed at the time of the accident. The 14 CFR Part 91 business flight was operating on an instrument rules flight plan. The pilot was uninjured. The flight departed from Colonel James Jabara Airport, Wichita, Kansas, at 1500 central daylight time, and was en route to Spirit of St. Louis Airport, Chesterfield, Missouri.
The pilot stated that following an instrument landing system approach to runway 26L, he was distracted when he dropped his approach plates while the airplane was about 10 feet above the runway. The airplane nose wheel then impacted the runway, and the airplane bounced.
Inspection of the accident site by a Federal Aviation Administration inspector revealed the presence of airplane tire debris from the runway and along the taxiway leading to the fixed base operator from where the pilot rented the airplane. The inspector estimated the taxi distance from the runway to the fixed base operator to be about 2 miles.
Aircraft
- Registration
- N558B
- Reported as
- Beech B-55
- Category
- Airplane
- Serial number
- 2341
- Engine
- Continental IO-470, reciprocating
- Damage
- Substantial damage
- Flight
- Business · Part 91
- Operator
- Skyline Aeronautics, LLC
- Registered owner
- Aero Associates Group, LLC
- Airworthiness certificate
- Standard, Normal
- Departed
- AAO · Wichita, KS
- Destination
- SUS · Chesterfield, MO
- Flight plan
- IFR
Matched to the registry by N-number and the event date; the registry’s history has gaps, so older matches can be wrong. Compare the reported make and model.
Flight crew
As NTSB recorded them. NTSB leaves out names.
- Role
- Pilot
- Age
- 50
- Certificates
- Private, Commercial
- Airplane ratings
- Single-engine land, Multi-engine land
- Instrument ratings
- Airplane
- Medical
- Class 2
- Flight hours
- 1,950 total · 167 in this make and model · 45 in the last 90 days · 15 in the last 30 days
Weather
- Conditions
- Instrument (IMC) · Day
FAA reports on this event · 1
The FAA’s own accident and incident reports, matched to the aircraft by N-number and date.