CHI94LA034 · Cessna 175
Cessna 175 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water while maneuvering
From an unrecorded airport to Hot Springs, SD
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI94LA034
- 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
Cessna 175
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 175
- 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
- N7112M
- Operator
- John T. Blatchford · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Hot Springs, SD
- 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 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Other crewmember › Altitude, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Altitude, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE FLIGHT WAS A LOCAL INSTRUMENT PROFICIENCY FLIGHT. THE PILOT-IN-COMMAND WAS WEARING VISION RESTRICTING DEVICES. A SAFETY PILOT WAS IN THE RIGHT FRONT SEAT. THE PILOT HAD JUST COMPLETED 7 INSTRUMENT APPROACHES AT RAPID CITY AND WAS RETURNING TO HOT SPRINGS. A PILOT PREPARING TO TAKEOFF FROM HOT SPRINGS HEARD THE PILOT REPORT DOWNWIND FOR RUNWAY 1, BUT NEVER SAW THE AIRPLANE. THE AIRPLANE COLLIDED WITH HILLY, UPWARD SLOPING TERRAIN 3 MI WEST OF THE AIRPORT. NO AIRCRAFT OR ENGINE MALFUNCTIONS WERE FOUND.
Probable cause
THE FAILURE OF THE PILOTS TO MAINTAIN SUFFICIENT ALTITUDE TO ENSURE TERRAIN CLEARANCE. FACTORS WHICH CONTRIBUTED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: THE DARK NIGHT AND RISING TERRAIN.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI94LA034
- Event ID
- 20001211X13720
- Case number
- CHI94LA034
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (5)
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1993-11-10.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 2d49da408f70f74212f4676a3ea38d3148f3ed6e0cdb65ad80aadcbf512c44b1; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:19:30.361Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: destination. The narrative states the pilot "HAD JUST COMPLETED 7 INSTRUMENT APPROACHES AT RAPID CITY AND WAS RETURNING TO HOT SPRINGS" and reported downwind for runway 1 there; the destination was not recorded.