NYC92FA073 · Piper PA-28-140
Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: in flight collision with object during initial climb
From Minerva Airport (OH15) to Minerva Airport (OH15)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC92FA073
- 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-28-140
- 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
- N9741W
- Operator
- James L. MC Laughlin · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Minerva Airport (OH15)To Minerva Airport (OH15)
- 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 object
- 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 › Aircraft handling, improper
- Pilot in command › Compensation for wind conditions, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Directional control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Proper climb rate, not attained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT MADE THE TAKEOFF USING ONE NOTCH OF FLAPS INSTEAD OF THE RECOMMENDED TWO NOTCHES OF FLAPS. HE GOT AIRBORNE IN GROUND EFFECT AND THEN ACCELERATED TO BEST RATE OF CLIMB AIRSPEED INSTEAD OF USING BEST ANGLE OF CLIMB SPEED TO CLEAR OBSTACLES AS RECOMMENDED. ONCE AIRBORNE, THE AIRPLANE WAS STRUCK BY MULTIPLE GUSTY CROSS WINDS WHICH BLEW THE AIRPLANE TOWARD HIGHER TERRAIN. THE PILOT SAID HE CORRECTED EACH TIME BY LOWERING THE NOSE AND USING AILERON, HOWEVER, THE CORRECTIONS WERE INSUFFICIENT FOR THE AMOUNT OF WIND THAT WAS PRESENT. THE AIRPLANE STRUCK A SERIES OF TREES WHILE CLIMBING AND THEN STRUCK THE GROUND. THE PILOT HELD A PRIVATE PILOT CERTIFICATE, HAD LESS THAN 100 HOURS, AND HAD RECEIVED HIS LICENSE 2 MONTHS PRIOR TO THE ACCIDENT.
Probable cause
THE FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO MAINTAIN DIRECTIONAL CONTROL WHICH RESULTED IN THE AIRPLANE FLYING OVER HIGHER TERRAIN WITH A CLIMB RATE THAT WAS INSUFFICIENT TO CLEAR THE OBSTACLES. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE THE PILOT'S LACK OF TOTAL EXPERIENCE AND THE GUSTY CROSS WIND.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC92FA073
- Event ID
- 20001211X14495
- Case number
- NYC92FA073
- 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: 62c6bda9e66373cee3196ad4ce69f01d878009f823756651af4d01716956d14f; retrieved 2026-09-21T01:17:26.409Z.