LAX99FA036 · Cessna 172P
Cessna 172P and Cessna TR182 · Accident: midair collision on approach
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX99FA036
- 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
- 2 · 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
Aircraft 1 · Cessna 172P
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N99064
- Operator
- Karl G. Gimbel · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sundsvall-Härnösand Airport (SDL)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
- Midair collision
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Aircraft 2 · Cessna TR182
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 182
- 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
- N6342T
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sundsvall-Härnösand Airport (SDL)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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Midair collision
- 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
- Dual student › Visual lookout, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Visual lookout, inadequate
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Visual lookout, not maintained
- Pilot of other aircraft › Visual lookout, inadequate
- Pilot of other aircraft › Visual lookout, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
N99064, a Cessna 172P reported inbound for landing 3 miles west of a shopping mall reporting point. The local controller told him to enter a right downwind for runway 21 and to 'report the mall inbound for downwind.' About this time, two aircraft (a Cessna 152 and the other airplane involved in the collision, N6342T, a Cessna TR182) were sequentially cleared for takeoff on runway 21 for right crosswind departures. The local controller then informed the 172 that there would be two aircraft making right downwind departures. The 172 pilot asked the controller if he would like him to make 360-degree turns, and the controller told the pilot to continue inbound and to 'maintain visual from the traffic.' The controller issued the inbound traffic to the 182, and the pilot and CFI responded 'negative contact.' The controller informed the 172 that the first of the departures was now in a right crosswind turn. The 172 pilot replied that 'I'm looking.' The controller told the 182 pilot that as he made his right turn, traffic would be at his 11 o'clock position, about 2 miles, northeast bound, and in the pattern. The 182 pilot said he was still looking for the traffic. The 172 pilot reported to the controller that he had a Cessna in front of him. The controller acknowledged and told him that he had additional traffic off his right wing that was currently in a right crosswind turn. The 182 pilot reported that he had 'traffic in sight.' The controller advised him to 'maintain visual from the traffic,' then advised the 172 that 'traffic has you in sight.' The 172 pilot replied that he did not have the traffic. Reconstruction found that the spinner and cowling of the 182 had struck the right side empennage of the 172. Scottsdale Airport, a visual flight rules Air Traffic Control Tower, is equipped with D-BRITE which obtains data from the Phoenix ASR-9. Terrain restrictions prevent the radar from painting targets below 3,000 feet Mean Sea Level (MSL) in the Scottsdale area. The traffic pattern altitude at Scottsdale is 2,500 feet MSL. The D-BRITE has an automated conflict alert.
Probable cause
the failure of the solo student pilot to acquire and maintain separation from a departing aircraft in the airport traffic pattern, which had been issued as traffic by the local controller. Also causal was the failure of the pilot and instructor in the other aircraft to maintain separation from this aircraft, which they had previously acknowledged as in sight. The inadequate D-BRITE radar repeater in the tower cab was a factor in this accident.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX99FA036
- Event ID
- 20001211X11449
- Case number
- LAX99FA036
- 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: 0b79cf20ec941dde90d8e1f242cc476dd9e82c266b81d89e8aeef743668c8ce5; retrieved 2026-09-20T22:19:01.054Z.