IAD97FA025 · Aero Commander 681
Aero Commander 681 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Greene County/Lewis A. Jackson Regional Airport (I19) to Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport (MFD)
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD97FA025
- 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
Aero Commander 681
- Aircraft type
- Aero Commander 681
- 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
- N9129N
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Greene County/Lewis A. Jackson Regional Airport (I19), Dayton, OHTo Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport (MFD), OH
- 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 final 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
- Wire, transmission
- 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 › Altitude/clearance, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Minimum descent altitude, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
After 2 previous attempts, the pilot was cleared for a third VOR Runway 14 Approach. He was issued landing information, and he reported the airport in sight. The minimum descent altitude (MDA) for the approach was 1,620 ft msl. The airport elevation was 1297 ft. The airplane was observed by an ATC controller to descend, and the controller's Brite scope (radar) displayed 1,400 ft. The controller observed the airplane's landing light bob up and down, followed by the nose pitching up. At about the same time, a ground witness in the area saw the airplane at low altitude; according to this witness, the pilot tried to 'pull the plane up' just before it collided with the static cable of a power line. The cable was about 85 feet above ground level (1,382 feet MSL) and approximately 2 miles from the approach end of the runway. No preimpact malfunction of the airplane, engine, or VOR was found.
Probable cause
the pilot's early descent below the minimum descent altitude (MDA), while preparing to land from an instrument approach, and his failure to maintain adequate altitude and clearance from obstruction(s).
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD97FA025
- Event ID
- 20001208X07044
- Case number
- IAD97FA025
- 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: 26a9869fcf2be6c282196a6a78c3dd6ec696ebd38c2e9724b654dd1105ccb333; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:06:13.040Z.