CHI95DTK01 · GAY RV-4
GAY RV-4 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water while maneuvering
From Sioux Falls Regional Airport (FSD) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI95DTK01
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
GAY RV-4
- Aircraft type
- Gay RV-4
- 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
- N29PG
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sioux Falls Regional Airport (FSD), Sioux Falls, SDTo not recorded
- 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
- Maneuvering
- 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 terrain/water
- 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 › Altitude, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
A WITNESS REPORTED THAT THE AIRPLANE WAS FLYING LOW ALTITUDE AEROBATIC MANEUVERS IN THE VICINITY OF THE ACCIDENT SITE. RADAR TRACKING DATA, AVAILABLE ABOVE AN ALTITUDE OF APPROX 800 FT AGL, ALSO SHOWS A VFR TARGET CONDUCTING LOW ALTITUDE AEROBATIC MANEUVERS. EXAMINATION OF THE WRECKAGE REVEALED NO EVIDENCE OF PREIMPACT AIRCRAFT OR ENGINE MALFUNCTION. THE AIRPLANE HAD COME TO REST 132 FT FROM THE FIRST IMPACT WITH THE GROUND. TOXICOLOGICAL TESTS REVEALED 0.031 UG/ML BROMPHENIRAMINE AND 0.012 UG/ML DIPHENHYDRAMINE IN THE BLOOD SPECIMEN. THERAPEUTIC LEVELS ARE 0.016-0.070 AND 0.100 RESPECTIVELY. BROMPHENIRAMINE AND DIPHENHYDRAMINE (ANTIHISTAMINES) ARE ACTIVE INGREDIENTS IN MANY NONPRESCRIPTION COLD AND ALLERGY MEDICATIONS, AND CAN CAUSE DROWSINESS.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN ADEQUATE ALTITUDE WHILE PERFORMING AEROBATIC MANEUVERS. THE PILOT'S IMPAIRMENT OF JUDGMENT AND PERFORMANCE DUE TO DRUGS WAS A FACTOR.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI95DTK01
- Event ID
- 20001207X02830
- Case number
- CHI95DTK01
- 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: 1efe25e27c17cef16ccc361060f203beb56c2fb13409fd84fb50c0803136c22d; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:53:34.394Z.