ATL97FA060 · Beech C23
Beech C23 · Accident: in flight collision with object while maneuvering
From 19A · Jefferson, GA to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL97FA060
- 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
Beech C23
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 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
- N6005T
- Operator
- Sam H. Morton · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 19A · Jefferson, GATo 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
- Maneuvering
- 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 › Altitude/clearance, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Impairment(alcohol)
- Pilot in command › Judgment, poor
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
An eyewitness near the accident site reported that an airplane was flying low over the city minutes before the accident. Another witness heard the sound of the engine, followed by the crashing sound of the airplane as it collided with trees and a house. According to the owner, at 2100, he parked the airplane (N6005T) on the ramp in front of the maintenance facility. The following morning, the owner arrived at the maintenance facility, and could not find his airplane. After learning of an aircraft accident in a nearby city, the owner traveled to the accident site and discovered that the accident airplane was his. Examination of the airframe failed to disclose a mechanical malfunction or a subsystem failure. Toxicology tests of the pilot revealed a blood/alcohol level of 180 mg/dl (0.180%) and an alcohol level of 245 mg/dl (0.245%) in vitreous fluid. The owner of the airplane stated that the keys for N6005T were still in his possession. The keys recovered from the ignition switch of N6005T showed an 'N' number of 6623P.
Probable cause
pilot impairment of judgment and performance, due to alcohol; and his failure to maintain sufficient altitude or clearance from obstacles, while maneuvering at low altitude at night. Darkness was a related factor.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL97FA060
- Event ID
- 20001208X07660
- Case number
- ATL97FA060
- 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: 1d26f57aa5b08ef5fe14ae7735f472c224322b0e5f1de13157b68067aeec0329; retrieved 2026-09-20T22:59:35.045Z.