SEA93FA153 · Piper PA-34-220T
Flightcraft Piper PA-34-220T · Accident: in flight collision with object while maneuvering
From Portland International Airport (PDX) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA93FA153
- 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
Piper PA-34-220T
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-34
- 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
- N8472C
- Operator
- Flightcraft
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Portland International Airport (PDX), Portland, ORTo 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 › Proper altitude, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE AIRPLANE DEPARTED PORTLAND INTNL ARPT ON A MAINTENANCE CHECK FLT, CLIMBED TO 1900 FT MSL & PROCEDED TO OVERFLY THE PILOT'S RESIDENCE. SUCH OVERFLIGHTS WERE NOT UNCOMMON ACCORDING TO THE PILOT'S WIFE. RADAR DATA SHOWED THE ACFT FLYING A LEFT 360 DEG CIRCLE AT 1900 FT (APPROX 1000 FT ABOVE GND) BEFORE RADAR CONTACT WAS LOST. WITNESES CONFIRMED THE CIRCULAR ORBIT. EARLY INTO THE 2ND ORBIT THEY OBSERVED THE ACFT EXECUTE A STEEP LEFT TURN DURING WHICH THE NOSE DROPPED AND THE ACFT BEGAN A DESCENT, STRIKING A TREE AT A POINT APPROX 110 FT ABOVE THE GROUND IMPACT SITE & SEVERING THE OUTBOARD LEFT WING SECTION. THE ACFT THEN DESCENDED TO THE GND WHILE ROLLING LEFT ABOUT ITS LONGITUDINAL AXIS. PROP SLASH MARKS ASSOCIATED WITH BOTH ENGINES INDICATED APPROXIMATELY 2200 & 2900 RPM FOR THE LEFT & RGT ENGINES RESPECTIVELY UPON GND IMPACT. POST CRASH EXAM REVEALED NO EVIDENCE OF ANY CONTROL MALFUNCTION WITHIN THE ACFT.
Probable cause
THE PILOT IN COMMAND'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN ADEQUATE ALTITUDE DURING HIS MANEUVER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA93FA153
- Event ID
- 20001211X12999
- Case number
- SEA93FA153
- 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: 3183788fa66a86e018ea60011d6c636c58389d4567ff7d21c1f6100ea07391ae; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:28:01.147Z.