ATL91FA041 · Beech K35
Beech K35 · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Chicago Executive Airport (PWK) to Chattanooga Metropolitan Airport (Lovell Field) (CHA)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL91FA041
- 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
Beech K35
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 35
- 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
- N99RN
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Chicago Executive Airport (PWK), Wheeling, ILTo Chattanooga Metropolitan Airport (Lovell Field) (CHA), Chattanooga, TN
- 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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
- Tower
- 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
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DURING AN IFR FLT AT NIGHT, THE PLT ENCOUNTERED LIGHT RIME ICING CONDITIONS AND WAS CLEARED TO DSCND FROM 7000 FT TO 5000 FT MSL. ABOUT 14 MIN LATER, HE RPRTD THAT AN ENG POWER LOSS HAD OCCURRED AND THAT HE WAS UNABLE TO MAINTAIN ALTITUDE. WHILE BEING VECTORED TO A NEARBY ARPT, THE ACFT COLLIDED WITH A 112 FT HAM RADIO TOWER, ABOUT 60 FT AGL, THEN CRASHED. WITNESSES RPRTD THE ENG WAS AT IDLE POWER DURING IMPACT. DURING AN INVESTIGATION OF THE ACDNT, NO PREIMPACT PART FAILURE, FUEL CONTAMINATION OR VERIFICATION OF STRUCTURAL ICE WAS FOUND. THE HAM RADIO TOWER WAS NOT EQUIPPED WITH AN IDENTIFICATION LIGHT, NOR WAS THERE A REQUIREMENT FOR IT TO BE LIGHTED.
Probable cause
PARTIAL LOSS OF ENGINE FOR AN UNDETERMINED REASON. THE ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS, DARKNESS, AND RADIO TOWER WERE RELATED FACTORS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL91FA041
- Event ID
- 20001212X16258
- Case number
- ATL91FA041
- 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: 5ac32a6dd66ef4257cce7b59169627b7d8f19942b40ee668f71b8462d396639b; retrieved 2026-09-21T02:00:27.542Z.