Veteran Pilot Warns About Recognizing the Hidden Danger

86-year-old recounts near-disastrous experience with weight and balance.

Wednesday, April 29, 2026 at 08:00 AM ET

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The author says that had he entered a stall spin, the water would have been gone during a postcrash inspection. [Image: Joel Kimmel]

Key Takeaways:

A flight in a Cessna 205 with a steel load nearly resulted in an unrecoverable stall spin due to a dangerously aft center of gravity, caused by water accumulated in the tail cone from a plugged drain.
The author learned crucial lessons through personal experiences and club incidents, highlighting the importance of thorough pre-flight inspections, accurate weight and balance calculations, and reliable instrument flying skills.
Key takeaways include the unreliability of owner's manual performance data, the dangers of environmental factors like mesa downdrafts, and the necessity of continuously learning and respecting flight conditions.

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I obtained my private pilot certificate in 1970 in a Cessna 150. We all remember our first solo. During mine, a United Airlines flight came in and I needed to extend downwind. A little frightening.

My wife followed with her own solo a few years later, for safety for our little family of two children. Rules were different back then, and our first family flight was in that Cessna 150, with no seat belts for our 4-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter.