Superior Aviation Cessna 404 accident
Cessna 404 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Capital Region International Airport (LAN) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI94LA052
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Cessna 404
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 404
- 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
- N8919G
- Operator
- Superior Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Capital Region International Airport (LAN), Lansing, MITo 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Minimum descent altitude, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
EN ROUTE THE PILOT LEARNED THAT HIS DESTINATION VOR WAS OUT OF SERVICE. HOWEVER, AS HE APPROACHED THE VOR, IT WAS TURNED ON SO HE COULD SHOOT THE APPROACH. CONCERNED THAT THE VOR WOULD ONLY BE ON FOR A SHORT TIME, THE PILOT 'HURRIED THE APPROACH FROM THAT MOMENT ON.' DURING THE APPROACH THE AIRPLANE STRUCK WHAT THE PILOT THOUGHT WERE BIRDS. AFTER LANDING, HE EXAMINED THE AIRPLANE FOR DAMAGE AND FOUND DEBRIS FROM A TREE STRIKE.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S DESCENT BELOW THE MINIMUM DESCENT ALTITUDE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI94LA052
- Event ID
- 20001211X13837
- Case number
- CHI94LA052
- 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: acf6980d141272ebcee9ddb9aab1f6e76d3105c268332988f5579246edc57410; retrieved 2026-09-18T18:24:12.932Z.