ATL94FA131 · Beech H-35
Beech H-35 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From Bruce Campbell Field (MBO) to Gainesville Regional Airport (GNV)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL94FA131
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Beech H-35
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft H-35
- 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
- N7917D
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Bruce Campbell Field (MBO), Madison, MSTo Gainesville Regional Airport (GNV), Gainesville, FL
- 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 › Weather evaluation, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
ACCORDING TO AIR TRAFFIC, THE VFR ONLY PILOT RECEIVED A PREFLIGHT WEATHER BRIEFING. THUNDERSTORM ACTIVITY WAS FORECASTED ALONG THE INTENDED ROUTE OF FLIGHT. WHILE ENROUTE, THE PILOT ENTERED AN AREA OF THUNDERSTORM ACTIVITY AND REQUESTED AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL ASSISTANCE. THE AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLER ATTEMPTED TO PROVIDE THE PILOT WITH RADAR VECTORS BUT, NEVER GOT A RESPONSE FROM THE PILOT. THE PILOT'S LAST TRANSMISSION WAS, 'MAYDAY, MAYDAY, WE'RE GOING DOWN'. SECONDS LATER, RADIO AND RADAR CONTACT WERE LOST; AN ELT SIGNAL WAS RECEIVED BY ANOTHER AIRCRAFT IN THE VICINITY OF THE LAST RADAR HIT. THE AIRCRAFT WRECKAGE WAS SCATTERED OVER A WOODED AREA 2500 FEET LONG AND 300 FEET WIDE. EXAMINATION OF THE WRECKAGE PATH REVEALED THAT THE LEFT AND RIGHT WING ASSEMBLIES WERE LOCATED 600 FEET APART NORTH OF THE MAIN WRECKAGE. EXAMINATION OF THE MAIN WING SPAR FRACTURE REVEALED THAT THE OVERLOAD FAILURE OCCURRED IN AN UPWARD DIRECTION. FLIGHT COMPONENTS FROM THE EMPENNAGE WERE LOCATED SOUTH OF THE MAIN WRECKAGE. EXAMINATION OF THE LEFT RUDDERVATOR ASSEMBLY DISCLOSED THAT IT SEPARATED FROM THE AIRFRAME IN AN UPWARD DIRECTION.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO AVOID AN AREA OF THUNDERSTORM ACTIVITY, WHICH RESULTED IN A LOSS OF CONTROL AND THE DESIGNED STRUCTURAL LIMITS OF THE AIRFRAME BEING EXCEEDED. THE THUNDERSTORMS WERE A FACTOR IN THE ACCIDENT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL94FA131
- Event ID
- 20001206X01655
- Case number
- ATL94FA131
- 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: 7c65769e562f740b679c5887403257389c78e30b73057d13f68e5a354eddd018; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:05:33.660Z.