NYC94FA029 · Aerospatiale TB-21
Aerospatiale TB-21 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water during initial climb
From Lebanon Municipal Airport (LEB) to Cuyahoga County Airport (CGF)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC94FA029
- 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
- 2 · 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
Aerospatiale TB-21
- Aircraft type
- Aerospatiale TB-21
- 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
- N28163
- Operator
- Klaus Eberius
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Lebanon Municipal Airport (LEB), Lebanon, NHTo Cuyahoga County Airport (CGF), Cleveland, OH
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Clearance, not maintained
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Lebanon, NH, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE AIRPLANE COLLIDED WITH TREES ON A HILL, ABOUT 1/2 MILE FROM THE AIRPORT (LEB). THE ACCIDENT SITE WAS ABOUT 250 FEET ABOVE THE AIRPORT ELEVATION. THE PILOT WAS ON A CLEARANCE, IN PART, TO CLIMB TO 6000 FEET; HE WAS IN RADIO CONTACT WITH THE LEB TOWER CONTROLLER. THE CONTROLLER REPORTED HE NOTICED THE AIRPLANE HAD TURNED TOO FAR LEFT AFTER TAKEOFF AND IT WAS HEADED TOWARD A HILL. HE ASKED THE PILOT IF HAD HAD THE HILL IN SIGHT, AND THE PILOT RESPONDED 'SAY AGAIN.' THE SURVIVING PASSENGER REPORTED HE OVERHEARD THE CONTROLLER CALLING THE PILOT TO ALERT HIM OF THE HILL AND THEREAFTER THE COLLISION OCCURRED. A SECOND PILOT WAS ABOARD, AS A SAFETY PILOT; HE WAS AN INSTRUMENT RATED FLIGHT INSTRUCTOR. ALTHOUGH BOTH PILOTS HAD PREVIOUSLY DEPARTED THE AIRPORT SEVERAL TIMES, ACCORDING TO THEIR LOGBOOKS, THE ACCIDENT FLIGHT WAS THEIR FIRST NIGHT DEPARTURE FROM THE AIRPORT. THE DEPARTURE PROCEDURE FOR THE AIRPORT, IN PART STATES, '...CLIMB VISUALLY OVER AIRPORT, TO CROSS THE AIRPORT AT OR ABOVE 1500 FEET, THEN PROCEED ON COURSE.'
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain adequate terrain clearance which resulted in an inflight collision with the terrain. A factor was a dark night condition.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC94FA029
- Event ID
- 20001211X13901
- Case number
- NYC94FA029
- 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: 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: c1a31ed278b212d483a99f488de2fb8ebb2cf3b5aca3eb4217f9d3491fbbd62a; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:18:00.662Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: departure. The narrative states the airplane collided with trees "ABOUT 1/2 MILE FROM THE AIRPORT (LEB)" after it "HAD TURNED TOO FAR LEFT AFTER TAKEOFF", on the pilots' "FIRST NIGHT DEPARTURE FROM THE AIRPORT"; the departure was not recorded.