NYC95FA162 · Cessna 140
Cessna 140 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water on approach
From Reading Regional Airport (Carl A Spaatz Field) (RDG) to Slatington Airport (69N)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC95FA162
- 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
Cessna 140
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 140
- 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
- N72546
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Reading Regional Airport (Carl A Spaatz Field) (RDG), Reading, PATo Slatington Airport (69N), Slatington, 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
- 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
- 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
- Flightcrew › Altitude/clearance, not maintained
- Flightcrew › In-flight planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flight departed at night with the pilot/owner and a pilot-rated passenger aboard. They were sharing flight duties on the third of a series of flights together, after the pilot rated passenger performed pilot duties on the second flight. Low clouds and fog prevailed; however, no weather briefing was obtained, other than checking the ATIS of a nearby airport. The pilots were receiving VFR advisories, and proceeding toward an uncontrolled airport located near a ridge that was higher in elevation than the altitude of the airplane. According to the pilot, the passenger was flying the aircraft, and they were navigating by dead reckoning. The approach controller asked the pilot if she was familiar with 'the ridge just to the north of slatington.' She replied that she was, but could not see it. As the flight continued, she was given the relative bearing and distance to the airport twice. After the second advisory, engine power was increased, and a turn toward the airport was initiated. However, the airplane collided with wooded/rocky terrain at the top of a mountain, about 3-1/2 miles northeast of the airport. Nearby at Allentown, the ATIS reported 400 ft scattered, 1100 ft overcast, visibility 6 miles with fog. The terminal forecast called for 400 ft broken, 5 miles visbility with fog, occasionally visibility 2 miles with fog.
Probable cause
The flight crew's improper in-flight planning/decision, and failure to maintain adequate clearance (or altitude) from mountainous terrain. Factors relating to the accident were: darkness, fog, low clouds, and the high terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC95FA162
- Event ID
- 20001207X04038
- Case number
- NYC95FA162
- 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: a7d2fe246601e8f20b6202c5e6fdad52e0e5c7f66cf19f9c32efeeea1b3e3521; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:41:56.838Z.