ATL91FA020 · Mooney M20F
Mooney M20F · Accident: airframe, component or system failure en route
From Charlotte-Monroe Executive Airport (EQY) to Grand Strand Airport (CRE)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL91FA020
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Mooney M20F
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N6858V
- Operator
- Blackwell, Billy · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Charlotte-Monroe Executive Airport (EQY), Monroe, NCTo Grand Strand Airport (CRE), GRAND STRAND, SC
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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 › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Spatial disorientation
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AFTER DEPARTING ON AN INSTRUMENT FLIGHT, THE PILOT REPORTED A SYSTEM PROBLEM AND REQUESTED CLEARANCE BACK TO THE DEPARTURE AIRPORT. SOON THEREAFTER, THE PILOT DECLARED AN EMERGENCY BECAUSE HE WAS EXPERIENCING A GYRO PROBLEM. NO FURTHER COMMUNICATION WAS RECEIVED FROM N6858V. INSTRUMENT WEATHER CONDITIONS PREVAILED AT THE TIME OF THE ACCIDENT. WITNESSES HEARD THE AIRPLANE FLYING IN CLOUDS BEFORE IT CRASHED. REPORTEDLY, IT MADE AN 'S' TURN, THEN IT WAS OBSERVED BELOW THE CLOUDS, SECONDS BEFORE IMPACT. THE AIRPLANE WAS EXTENSIVELY DAMAGED DURING IMPACT. AN EXAM OF THE FLIGHT CONTROLS FAILED TO DISCLOSE ANY OBVIOUS MALFUNCTION OR CONTROL FAILURE. EXAMINATION OF THE ELECTRICAL COMPONENTS AND VACUUM SYSTEM COMPONENTS FAILED TO INDICATE A MECHANICAL PROBLEM. BOTH GYROS SHOWED SIGNS OF ROTATION, AND THE VACUUM PUMP SUSTAINED IMPACT DAMAGE. A LOW LEVEL OF ETHANOL WAS DETECTED IN THE PILOT'S LIVER TISSUE, BUT NONE WAS FOUND IN KIDNEY TISSUE.
Probable cause
FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO MAINTAIN CONTROL OF THE AIRCRAFT, DUE TO SPATIAL DISORIENTATION. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: THE WEATHER CONDITIONS AND THE MALFUNCTION OF A GYRO INSTRUMENT (PROBABLY THE ATTITUDE INDICATOR).
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL91FA020
- Event ID
- 20001212X16255
- Case number
- ATL91FA020
- 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: 94f73054c6b65cbce00b03ea6cf2b7384b0ce6e0e75d9b47abd02f1b09aee1a7; retrieved 2026-09-21T02:01:38.708Z.