FTW95LA383 · Piper PA-23
Piper PA-23 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure on approach
From Greeley–Weld County Airport (GXY) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW95LA383
- 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
Piper PA-23
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-23
- 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
- N2291P
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Greeley–Weld County Airport (GXY)To 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
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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 › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › Unsuitable terrain or takeoff/landing/taxi area, selected
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AFTER ENTERING THE PATTERN ON RETURN FROM A LOCAL AREA PERSONAL FLIGHT, THE PILOT COULD NOT GET A DOWN-AND-LOCKED INDICATION OF THE NOSE LANDING GEAR. THE AIRPORT MANAGER INFORMED THE PILOT THAT ALL THREE LANDING GEAR APPEARED TO BE IN THE DOWN POSITION, AND SUGGESTED THAT HE CHECK THE LIGHT BULB AND CIRCLE UNTIL THE FIRE DEPARTMENT ARRIVED. THE PILOT REPLIED IN THE AFFIRMATIVE THEN LANDED THE AIRCRAFT IN A GRASS AREA BETWEEN THE RUNWAY AND TAXIWAY. THIS GRASS AREA WAS ROUGH AND UNEVEN. THE LANDING GEAR REMAINED DOWN AND LOCKED DURING THE LANDING ROLL. EXAMINATION OF THE AIRCRAFT REVEALED THE NOSE LANDING GEAR MICRO-SWITCH WAS OUT OF ADJUSTMENT. IN THE EVENT OF A NOSE LANDING GEAR UNSAFE INDICATION, THE AIRCRAFT OPERATING PROCEDURES WERE TO CONDUCT A NORMAL FULL FLAP LANDING AND HOLD THE NOSE GEAR FROM TOUCHING DOWN AS LONG AS POSSIBLE.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S IMPROPER IN-FLIGHT PLANNING/DECISION BY INADVERTENTLY SELECTING A LESS SUITABLE AREA FOR LANDING (THAN THE RUNWAY). FACTORS RELATING TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: A MALFUNCTION OF THE NOSE LANDING GEAR MICRO-SWITCH, WHICH RESULTED IN A FALSE INDICATION THAT THE NOSE LANDING GEAR WAS NOT DOWN-AND-LOCKED, AND ROUGH/UNEVEN TERRAIN IN THE SELECTED (GRASS) LANDING AREA BESIDE THE RUNWAY.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW95LA383
- Event ID
- 20001207X04496
- Case number
- FTW95LA383
- 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: 35282b9bfa7dafb1be35ba7a2391b24ab258a49f2c929c84fc90b26b4dc98f30; retrieved 2026-09-22T23:17:52.348Z.