BFO94FA015 · Piper PA-28-161
Piper PA-28-161 · Accident: in flight collision with object en route
From Sky Park Airport (46N) to Laurence G Hanscom Field (BED)
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO94FA015
- 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
- 4 · 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-28-161
- 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
- N3011F
- Operator
- Drobot, George JR · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sky Park Airport (46N), Red Hook, NYTo Laurence G Hanscom Field (BED), Bedford, MA
- 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
- En route · cruise
- 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
- 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
- Atc personnel(dep/apch) › Identification of aircraft on radar, not attained
- Atc personnel(dep/apch) › Traffic advisory, not issued
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Northampton, MA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
A PIPER PA-28, N3011F, WAS IN VFR CRUISE FLIGHT HEADING EASTBOUND AT ABOUT 5700' MSL, AS A CESSNA 210 (PARACHUTE JUMP PLANE) HAD JUST COMPLETED A CLEARING TURN TO A WESTBOUND HEADING, INTO THE SUN, AT 7300' MSL. A PARACHUTIST JUMPED FROM THE JUMP PLANE & STRUCK THE VERTICAL STABILIZER OF THE PA-28 AFTER A FEW SECONDS OF FREE FALL. CONTROL OF THE PA-28 WAS LOST, & IT CRASHED IN AN UNCONTROLLED DESCENT. THE JUMP PLANE WAS IN RADAR & RADIO COMMUNICATION WITH AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL (ATC) IN ORDER TO RECEIVE TRAFFIC ADVISORIES PER THE FAA ATC CONTROLLER'S HANDBOOK. THE PA-28 WAS RECORDED ON RADAR. NO ADVISORIES WERE ISSUED TO THE JUMP PLANE AFTER THE PILOT CALLED '1 MINUTE PRIOR TO JUMP.' TESTS SHOWED THAT ONE TRANSCEIVER IN THE PA-28 WAS TUNED TO 120.30 MHZ; A WARNING FOR PARACHUTE JUMPING WAS GIVEN OVER THIS FREQUENCY. A 1/8' PARACHUTE SYMBOL (COLORED BLUE) WAS DEPICTED ON THE SECTIONAL CHART AND WAS SUPERIMPOSED OVER A RIVER (ALSO COLORED BLUE). THE CONTROLLER WAS RECEIVING ON-THE-JOB TRAINING FROM A FULL PERFORMANCE CONTROLLER.
Probable cause
FAILURE OF THE AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL (ATC) FACILITY TO IDENTIFY AND PROVIDE THE REQUIRED TRAFFIC INFORMATION TO THE JUMP AIRCRAFT BEFORE RELEASE OF THE JUMPER(S). A FACTOR RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WAS: INADEQUATE VISUAL LOOKOUT BY THE PILOT OF THE JUMP AIRCRAFT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO94FA015
- Event ID
- 20001211X13693
- Case number
- BFO94FA015
- 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: a9beb3e2fc78e061d994bc1cb011c78c25340b1d04cb18244bed43945180ddef; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:18:49.154Z.