BFO93LA136 · Piper PA-28-180
Tamarack Flying Club Piper PA-28-180 and East Coast Aero Club Piper PA-38-112 · Accident: midair collision on approach
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO93LA136
- 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
Aircraft 1 · Piper PA-28-180
- 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
- N9044J
- Operator
- Tamarack Flying Club
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Walter J. Koladza Airport (GBR), GR BARRINGTON, MATo 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 final
- 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
- Substantial
Aircraft 2 · Piper PA-38-112
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-38
- 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
- N91357
- Operator
- East Coast Aero Club
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Laurence G Hanscom Field (BED), Bedford, MATo 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 final
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Communications equipment, not selected
- Pilot in command › Visual lookout, inadequate
- Pilot of other aircraft › Communications equipment, not selected
- Pilot of other aircraft › Visual lookout, inadequate
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Pittsfield, MA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
BOTH THE PA-28, N9044J, AND THE PA-38, N91357, WERE ON FINAL APPROACH TO RWY 26 WHEN THEY COLLIDED ABOUT 1/4 MI FROM THE RUNWAY THRESHOLD, AND ABOUT 200 FT ABOVE THE GROUND. BOTH PILOTS STATED THAT THEY REPORTED THEIR POSITION ON UNICOM. HOWEVER, SEVERAL WITNESSES WHO WERE MONITORING THE RADIO STATED THEY ONLY HEARD THE PILOT OF THE PA-38 REPORT HER POSITION. THE RADIOS OF THE PA-28, N9044J, WERE FOUND TUNED TO THE UNICOM FREQUENCY OF THE DEPARTURE AIRPORT.
Probable cause
THE FAILURE OF THE PILOT OF THE PA-28, N9044J, TO PROPERLY TUNE HIS RADIOS, AND HIS FAILURE TO SEE AND AVOID THE PA-38, N91357.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO93LA136
- Event ID
- 20001211X12811
- Case number
- BFO93LA136
- 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: 897f99c92ca1de2ce1bd73ef0793b830e86f76b3ae4c574ccf195fb53d78be3a; retrieved 2026-09-21T22:52:04.141Z.