BradJBenson

Your thoughts mimic mine exactly. I'm pretty sure the loss of control happened on the ground with the gear fully down. I know this pilot had a history of messing up airplanes. Maybe he just screwed up.

Funny you mention this about the wings falling off. When installing new avionics and instrumentation about 2 years ago in that plane, the shop found a large rat's nest on top of the wing spar. Pee and other nasty things had caused pretty severe corrosion to the wing spar cap. Photos were taken and sent to Mooney engineers in Kerrville who said it was severe enough that the spar cap should be replaced. It was a pretty big job--costly, too, at about $15,000. I guess the shop did good work as it appears the wing won and the wood fence clearly lost this battle.

Exactly what you said, Shadrich. Other than power to full, there's not much else "important" to do. (After you're safely climbing, you can make sure your cowl flaps are open, gear goes up, verify prop and mixture full forward, and retract flaps...however, if you're just making a lap in the pattern, the gear and flaps hardly matter.) There were two people aboard and that plane never had a problem climbing in any configuration. I just don't think his piloting skills were up to par.

While I'm no expert on accidents (have only had one of my own ), based on the damage to the plane and the details in the various articles, I'm thinking he was fully on the ground when he lost control. I see no evidence of a stall, merely "loss of directional control after landing while attempting to configure for a go around."

I'm pretty sure you'll find that it was pilot error. In one photo, the left main is clearly down. You can even see the 3 tire marks in the grass before it hit the fence.

Current owner: https://www.zocdoc.com/doctor/james-mccrum-od-26845

My brother and I owned this plane until about 7 months ago. (Hi John...sorry the purchase didn't work out for you.) I bumped across this thread and had to comment. We had the plane for about 3 years before selling it to get a Cirrus. It was a nice flying plane with nicely updated avionics, but like any 50 year old Mooney, it had its quirks including a few oil leaks and previous damage history. The man that bought it was an optomologist who spent time between WA and AZ. His father-in-law lived at Airpark Dallas and he was, no doubt, there for a visit. He purchased this plane because he had recently had a gear-up landing in another plane. He confessed that it wasn't his first one either. He wasn't sure if he was even going to try to get insurance, he said. So, let's just say he might be hard on airplanes. That said, I'm glad he walked away from it with nothing hurt but his pride and old N3386X. One article I read said he landed but felt he was coming in too fast and attempted a go-around. I guess he lost directional control and veered off the runway. Hopefully it wasnt the farher-in-law's yard he crashed into. That would be an embarrassing way to visit your relatives.