FTW95LA276 · Cessna 150F
Cessna 150F · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From MJT · Montrose, CO to 0V2 · Salida, CO
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW95LA276
- 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
- 0 · 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
Cessna 150F
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 150
- 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
- N8155S
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From MJT · Montrose, COTo 0V2 · Salida, CO
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Flight to destination alternate, delayed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AS THE PILOT APPROACHED MONARCH PASS (ELEVATION 11,312 FEET MSL), HE DETERMINED THAT CLOUD COVERAGE AHEAD WOULD NOT ALLOW HIM TO CONTINUE UNDER VISUAL METEOROLOGICAL CONDITIONS. AS HE TURNED THE AIRPLANE AROUND, IT BEGAN TO LOSE ALTITUDE. THE PILOT WAS UNABLE TO ARREST THE DESCENT RATE, AND HE MADE A 'HARD LANDING' ON THE HIGHWAY. ACCORDING TO THE MANUFACTURER, THE SERVICE CEILING OF THE CESSNA 150F IS 12,650 FEET MSL. DENSITY ALTITUDE WAS 11,777 FEET AT THE PASS. THE PILOT LATER SAID HE WOULD 'NEVER FLY IN HIGH TERRAIN AGAIN, AT LEAST NOT WITHOUT GETTING SOME GOOD INSTRUCTION IN MOUNTAIN FLYING.'
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S DELAYED DECISION TO DEVIATE AWAY FROM THE DETERIORATING WEATHER. FACTORS WERE HIS INADEQUATE EVALUATION OF THE WEATHER, HIGH DENSITY ALTITUDE, AND THE RESULTANT INADVERTENT OPERATION OF THE AIRPLANE BEYOND THE CLIMB PERFORMANCE LIMITATIONS OF THE AIRPLANE IN MANEUVERING FLIGHT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW95LA276
- Event ID
- 20001207X03725
- Case number
- FTW95LA276
- 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: 7a8d0aeaecff87dc3649341b9604bfebd0778c6c441023487173a5af44886018; retrieved 2026-09-22T23:43:26.067Z.