NYC95FA033 · Piper PA-28-181
Piper PA-28-181 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Elmira Corning Regional Airport (ELM) to N88 · PA
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's flight rules. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC95FA033
- 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-28-181
- 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
- N2949Q
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Elmira Corning Regional Airport (ELM), Elmira, NYTo N88 · PA
- 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 Possible conflict
- 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 · circling (IFR)
- 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 collision with object
- 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
- Tree(s)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, not followed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT AND PASSENGER WERE ON THE RETURN LEG OF A FLIGHT FOR COMPENSATION. THE EN ROUTE FLIGHT WAS UNEVENTFUL. DURING THE NIGHT WEATHER VOR APPROACH TO THE DESTINATION AIRPORT, THE PILOT DESCENDED 300 FEET BELOW THE MINIMUM DESCENT ALTITUDE. AFTER FLYING OVER THE RUNWAY, THE PILOT CIRCLED THE AIRPORT TWICE, BETWEEN 300 AND 500 FEET BELOW THE MINIMUM CIRCLING ALTITUDE. DURING THE THIRD CIRCLE, THE AIRPLANE STRUCK TREES ABOUT 1/4 MILE FROM THE RUNWAY. AN AIRPORT 8 MILES FROM THE ACCIDENT SCENE REPORTED THE WEATHER AS INDEFINITE 100 FOOT SKY OBSCURED, VISIBILITY 1/4 MILE, WITH LIGHT DRIZZLE AND FOG. NEITHER OF THE TWO VOR RECEIVERS IN THE AIRPLANE WERE TUNED TO THE FREQUENCY USED FOR THE VOR FINAL APPROACH COURSE, OR THE MISSED APPROACH PROCEDURE. DURING THE PREVIOUS 12 MONTHS THE PILOT HAD LOGGED ONE INSTRUMENT APPROACH.
Probable cause
the pilot's descent below the published minimum circling altitude, and his failure to execute the published missed approach procedure during a night IFR instrument approach, which resulted in an in-flight collision with trees.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC95FA033
- Event ID
- 20001206X02644
- Case number
- NYC95FA033
- 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 1994-11-22.
- API snapshot SHA-256: f6776b8a2dd342ed50e2f292cb9a751a7a4bd621c6417461ecaedb0e9dfb3003; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:55:58.165Z.