CHI96LA274 · Beech 35
Beech 35 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure on approach
From Fairmont Municipal Airport (FRM) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI96LA274
- 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
Beech 35
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 35
- 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
- N3392V
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Fairmont Municipal Airport (FRM), Farmington, MNTo 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 · VFR pattern downwind
- 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
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane's nose landing gear would not extend. During the attempts to extend the nose gear the pilot said he pitched the airplane up and down. The propeller began cavitating during these attempts. The pilot reported loosing oil pressure as he approached the runway. When he felt he would be able to land the pilot said he stopped the engine. He said the airplane '...just quit flying....' The airplane collided with the ground about 150 yards short of the runway threshold. Inspection of the airplane revealed an open oil sump quick-drain fitting and a broken nose gear retracting actuator arm (arm). The bottom of the airplane was covered with oil. About 50 percent of the arm's fracture surfaces were corroded. Representatives from the airframe stated the failed arm will allow the landing gear to be free in the nosegear well. The oil quick-drain finger-holds can be contacted by the nosegear when the airplane is pitched up and down. The propeller manufacturer stated the propeller will go into a high blade angle when the oil supply is stopped. He said the rotating propeller will cause a considerable amount of drag if it is still rotating.
Probable cause
an improper in-flight decision by the pilot when he shut the engine off as the airplane approached the landing runway. Factors associated with this accident were an inadequate maintenance inspection by the mechanic when the actuating arm fracture was not identified during the annual inspection occurring 5 months before the accident, and the pilot not maintaining a proper glidepath and descent rate on final approach after shutting his engine off.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI96LA274
- Event ID
- 20001208X06442
- Case number
- CHI96LA274
- 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: baf2fa6eacb90eefe22f8af8821d39d30834581c8c5d17fbfea45553e3b4259c; retrieved 2026-09-22T21:37:05.048Z.