NYC94FA065 · Piper AEROSTAR 601P AEROSTAR 6
Piper AEROSTAR 601P AEROSTAR 6 · Accident: loss of control in flight during initial climb
From Heritage Field (PTW) to Salisbury Ocean City Wicomico Regional Airport (SBY)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC94FA065
- 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
- API-reported fatalities
- 2 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- 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
Piper AEROSTAR 601P AEROSTAR 6
- Aircraft type
- Piper AEROSTAR 601
- 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
- N36444
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Heritage Field (PTW), Pottstown, PATo Salisbury Ocean City Wicomico Regional Airport (SBY), Salisbury, MD
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- 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
- First occurrenceThe 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
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Stall/mush
- 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
- Airframe › Ice
- Pilot in command › Ice/frost removal from aircraft, not performed
- Pilot in command › Impairment(drugs)
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AT 0815 EDT, N36444 LANDED WITH LIGHT SNOW FALLING & THE TEMPERATURE ABOVE FREEZING. SNOW CONTINUED FALLING & THE TEMPERATURE DROPPED BELOW FREEZING. AT ABOUT 1100, THE PILOT FILED AN IFR FLIGHT PLAN & HAD A LINEMAN BRUSH SNOW FROM THE WINGS. THE LINEMAN NOTED THAT PATCHES OF ICE REMAINED ON THE LEFT WING, BUT THE PILOT DECLINED TO DEICE THE PLANE. (AT AN AIRPORT 3 MILES AWAY, ANOTHER FLIGHT WAS DELAYED DUE TO ICE THAT HAD FORMED BELOW A SNOW COVER ON A PLANE THAT SAT OUTSIDE FROM 0945 TO 1100.) THE SURVIVING PASSENGER SAID THAT AFTER TAKEOFF, N36444 LOST LIFT & YAWED LEFT. IT APPEARED TO RECOVER, THEN VIBRATED, YAWED, BANKED LEFT, DESCENDED, & IMPACTED THE GROUND. AFTER THE ACCIDENT, THE ENGINES WERE TEST RUN WITH NO NOTABLE DEFICIENCIES. THERE WAS EVIDENCE THE PILOT WAS TAKING PRESCRIPTION MEDICATION. TESTS OF HIS BLOOD SHOWED 0.157 UG/ML OF DIAZEPAM & 0.134 UG/ML OF NORDIAZEPAM. TESTS OF HIS URINE SHOWED 0.152 UG/ML OF NORDIAZEPAM & 0.167 UG/ML OF OXAZEPAM. ON 3/2/90, THE PILOT HAD SURGERY FOR A TUMOR OF (OR NEAR) THE LEFT OPTIC NERVE. IN HIS LAST FAA MEDICAL APPLICATION, HE DENIED THAT HE HAD MEDICAL TREATMENT IN THE PREVIOUS 5 YEARS & DID NOT REPORT USE OF ANY MEDICATIONS. THE AVIATION MEDICAL EXAMINER HAD PRESCRIBED RESERPINE (FOR HYPERTENSION) & WAS AWARE OF THE SURGERY, BUT THIS WAS NOT REPORTED IN THE PILOT'S FAA MEDICAL RECORD.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO ENSURE THAT ICE WAS PROPERLY REMOVED FROM THE AIRPLANE BEFORE FLIGHT, POSSIBLY DUE TO IMPAIRMENT OF JUDGMENT CAUSED BY A PRESCRIPTION DRUG (VALIUM) THAT WAS NOT APPROVED FOR USE WHILE FLYING. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO PROPERLY REPORT HIS MEDICAL HISTORY ON HIS FAA MEDICAL APPLICATION, AND FAILURE OF THE DESIGNATED MEDICAL EXAMINER TO REPORT THE PILOT'S KNOWN MEDICAL HISTORY.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC94FA065
- Event ID
- 20001206X00973
- Case number
- NYC94FA065
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
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. 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: 5c5fafb68383285965379d7f7cbbb98ec47e53038ca604e7d490f7532a7b3df3; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:13:07.567Z.