FTW94FA208 · Piper PA-28R-201T PA-28R-201
Piper PA-28R-201T PA-28R-201 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From Albuquerque International Sunport (ABQ) to Tulsa International Airport (TUL)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW94FA208
- 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
- 1 · 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 PA-28R-201T PA-28R-201
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N9766K
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Albuquerque International Sunport (ABQ), Albuquerque, NMTo Tulsa International Airport (TUL), Tulsa, OK
- 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
- En route · cruise
- 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
- In flight encounter with weather
- 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
- Pilot in command › Design stress limits of aircraft, exceeded
- Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, continued
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Southard, OK, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE LEFT WING OF THE AIRPLANE SEPARATED FROM THE AIRPLANE IN FLIGHT AS THE NON-INSTRUMENT RATED PILOT ATTEMPTED TO MANEUVER THE AIRPLANE UNDER A LINE OF SEVERE CONVECTIVE ACTIVITY ALONG HIS ROUTE OF FLIGHT. RESIDENTS IN THE AREA REPORTED SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS AND HEAVY RAIN SHOWERS WITH WINDS GUSTING TO 50 MPH AND VISIBILITIES AS LOW AS A QUARTER OF A MILE. THE WEATHER BRIEFING PROVIDED TO THE PILOT APPROXIMATELY TWO HOURS PRIOR TO HIS DEPARTURE ADVISED HIM OF THE DEVELOPING AREA OF HEAVY THUNDERSTORM ACTIVITY AND THE PILOT WAS ADVISED THAT VFR FLIGHT WAS NOT RECOMMENDED. THE WRECKAGE WAS FOUND 3 DAYS LATER DISPERSED FOR OVER A HALF A MILE. THE LEFT WING WAS FOUND AT THE FARTHEST POINT FROM THE MAIN WRECKAGE, SEPARATED IN AN UPWARD AND AFT DIRECTION. CONTINUITY WAS ESTABLISHED TO ALL FLIGHT CONTROLS. EXAMINATION OF THE AIRPLANE AND ENGINE AT THE ACCIDENT SITE DID NOT DISCLOSE ANY MECHANICAL PROBLEMS.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S CONTINUED FLIGHT INTO KNOWN ADVERSE WEATHER RESULTING IN THE DESIGN LIMITS OF THE AIRPLANE BEING EXCEEDED. FACTORS WERE THE THUNDERSTORMS AND THE PILOT'S DISREGARD FOR THE FORECASTED ADVERSE WEATHER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW94FA208
- Event ID
- 20001206X01519
- Case number
- FTW94FA208
- 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: 26e4e87049f7fce183783cac3b5c66af5def37c0177087233dc18133c7aee860; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:06:45.031Z.