NYC95FA031 · Mooney M20J
Mooney M20J · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From Morristown Municipal Airport (MMU) to Chatham Municipal Airport (CQX)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC95FA031
- 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
Mooney M20J
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N5681Y
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Morristown Municipal Airport (MMU), Morristown, NJTo Chatham Municipal Airport (CQX), Chatham, MA
- 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
- Approach · IFR missed approach
- 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
- 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 › Aircraft control, not maintained
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Brewster, MA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
BEFORE TAKEOFF, THE PILOT OBTAINED A WEATHER BRIEFING FOR AN IFR FLIGHT & WAS TOLD THE WEATHER WAS BEING INFLUENCED BY A STATIONARY HURRICANE OVER THE ATLANTIC OCEAN. HE WAS ADVISED OF 3 AIRMET'S, WITH A FORECAST OF RAIN, DRIZZLE, FOG, MODERATE ISOLATED SEVERE TURBULENCE BELOW 15,000' & ICING ABOVE 12,000' ALONG THE ROUTE OF FLIGHT. THERE WAS NO WEATHER STATION AT THE DESTINATION, BUT AT THE TIME OF THE BRIEFING, THE HYANNIS WEATHER WAS IN PART: 3300' OVERCAST, VISIBILITY 7 MI WITH OCCASIONAL LIGHT DRIZZLE & WIND 110 DEG AT 12 KTS. DURING ARRIVAL, THE PILOT ENCOUNTERED DETERIORATING WEATHER WHILE ON AN NDB APPROACH. HE ELECTED TO DIVERT TO AN ALTERNATE & INITIATED A MISSED APPROACH. THE AIRPLANE CLIMBED 800' IN 12 SECONDS (TO 1600' MSL), THEN RADAR & RADIO CONTACT WERE LOST. THE AIRPLANE CRASHED IN A WOODED AREA, WHILE IN A STEEP DESCENT. NO PREIMPACT MECHANICAL FAILURE WAS EVIDENT. THE 2045 EST WEATHER AT HYANNIS WAS IN PART: 100' OBSCURED, VISIBILITY 1-1/4 MI WITH LIGHT RAIN & FOG, TEMPERATURE 60 DEGREES, DEW POINT 58 DEGREES & WIND 140 DEG AT 12 KTS.
Probable cause
FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO MAINTAIN CONTROL OF THE AIRPLANE DURING A MISSED APPROACH. A FACTOR RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WAS: THE DETERIORATING WEATHER CONDITION WITH A LOW CEILING AND RAIN.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC95FA031
- Event ID
- 20001206X02643
- Case number
- NYC95FA031
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1994-11-19.
- API snapshot SHA-256: c8c7dbb6b04fe9887cc50c679d98302eaf8f5f950e093aae1cf7118757abe7ca; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:56:16.025Z.