CHI96FA045 · Piper PA-28
Piper PA-28 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Watertown Municipal Airport (RYV) to Grove City Airport (29D)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI96FA045
- 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
- 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
- N8775W
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Watertown Municipal Airport (RYV), Watertown, WITo Grove City Airport (29D), Somerset, 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 · IFR initial 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 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, not followed
- Pilot in command › Minimum descent altitude, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Proper altitude, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was flying at night in IMC conditions. He contacted Cleveland ARTCC and requested radar vectors to the final approach course for the NDB runway 24 approach at Somerset, PA. During vectors for the approach, the pilot was cleared to descend and maintain 4,500 feet until established on the published segment of the approach, then was cleared for the NDB approach. While intercepting the final approach course, the pilot was informed of VFR traffic ahead at 3,500' and was asked to say his altitude. The pilot said he was at 3,700'. The controller then transmitted 'suggest you maintain 3,500 if you can, traffic twelve o'clock less than 2 miles, 3,300.' When the traffic was no longer a factor, the controller told the pilot 'traffic just passed underneath you, 3,300, you can resume your normal descent, cleared for the approach.' The airplane was still about 4.5 miles from the NDB. The minimum altitude at the final approach fix located at the NDB was 3,800 feet. The wreckage was located about 2.6 miles and 080 degrees from the Somerset NDB, and about one half mile south of the final approach course. Elevation at the wreckage site was about 2,630 feet. The minimum descent altitude for the NDB approach was 2,840 feet. Examination of the airplane and its engine failed to reveal any preimpact anomalies.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to follow instrument approach procedures, by not maintaining proper altitude and by descending below the minimum descent altitude. Factors relating to the accident were: the air traffic controller's failure to issue a proper clearance, the dark night, clouds, and mountainous terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI96FA045
- Event ID
- 20001207X04963
- Case number
- CHI96FA045
- 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: 26daa802650564873d722af7e743485bf7e8efbf264120cd30a11b8163b94ad1; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:30:40.887Z.