BFO93LA085 · Piper PA-28-140
Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water during initial climb
From 3I6 to 3I6
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO93LA085
- 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
Piper PA-28-140
- 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
- N6001U
- Operator
- Larry Williamson
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 3I6To 3I6
- 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
- In flight collision with terrain/water
- 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, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Clearance, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT STATED THAT HE ATTEMPTED TO TAKEOFF ON RUNWAY 13, BUT MIDFIELD HE ABORTED THAT TAKEOFF. HE STATED THAT HE NOTICED THE WIND FAVORED RUNWAY 31, SO HE SWITCHED RUNWAYS. HE REPORTED THAT THE TAKEOFF WAS NORMAL, HIS RATE OF CLIMB 300 FEET PER MINUTE AND AIRSPEED ABOUT 80 MPH. HE STATED THAT DURING THE CLIMB HE WAS ABOUT TO MAKE A RIGHT TURN INTO THE VALLEY WHEN HE FELT A DOWNDRAFT TO THE RT SIDE OF THE AIRPLANE. ACCORDING TO THE FAA THE AIRPORT IS SITUATED IN A MOUNTAIN VALLEY WITH HILLS ON BOTH SIDES AND A 400 FOOT HILL LOCATED ABOUT 1500 FEET BEYOND THE DEPARTURE END OF RUNWAY 31. THE LOCAL PILOTS WHEN DEPARTING USUALLY TURN 60 DEGREES LEFT OR RIGHT TO AVOID THE HILL. A WITNESS REPORTED SEEING THE AIRPLANE APPROACHING THE HILL, AND MAKING A STEEP RIGHT TURN BEFORE IT DESCENDED INTO THE TREES. THE PILOT REPORTED THAT THERE WAS NO MECHANICAL MALFUNCTION.
Probable cause
FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO MAINTAIN ADEQUATE ALTITUDE OR CLEARANCE FROM THE TERRAIN. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE THE UNFAVORABLE WIND CONDITION AND THE PROXIMITY OF THE HILL TO THE RUNWAY.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO93LA085
- Event ID
- 20001211X12315
- Case number
- BFO93LA085
- 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: fe15f5744fd14dc390b3e56ab316c50e25879fb44d2c9afa8d3ddabe8070c8c3; retrieved 2026-09-21T14:25:36.478Z.