LAX92FA283 · Cessna 336A
Cessna 336A · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water en route
From P06 · Bullhead City, AZ to Fullerton Municipal Airport (FUL)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX92FA283
- 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
- 5 · 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
Cessna 336A
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 336
- 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
- N3848U
- Operator
- Richard A. Niemela · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From P06 · Bullhead City, AZTo Fullerton Municipal Airport (FUL), Fullerton, CA
- 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
- In flight collision with terrain/water
- 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
- Visual flight rules (VFR) flight into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC)
- 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 › In-flight planning/decision, poor
- Pilot in command › VFR flight into imc, attempted
- Pilot in command › Weather evaluation, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT OBTAINED A BRIEFING FROM THE FAA FLIGHT SERVICE STATION PRIOR TO HIS PLANNED FLIGHT. THE BRIEFER, IN PART, TOLD THE PILOT THAT MOUNTAIN OBSCURATIONS WERE FORECAST FOR CALIFORNIA. THE PILOT AND HIS 4 PASSENGERS DEPARTED ON THEIR PLANNED CROSS COUNTRY FLIGHT. THE AIRPLANE AND ITS OCCUPANTS DID NOT RETURN ON TIME AND FAMILY MEMBERS REPORTED THEM MISSING TO THE AUTHORITIES. A SEARCH WAS INITIATED, BUT WAS CALLED OFF THE NIGHT OF THE ACCIDENT DUE TO ADVERSE WEATHER. AFTER THREE WEEKS, THE OFFICIAL SEARCH WAS TERMINATED. THE PILOT'S FATHER CONTINUED THE SEARCH AND LOCATED THE DOWNED AIRPLANE WRECKAGE AT ABOUT THE 7,000 FOOT LEVEL OF A MOUNTAIN ABOUT 8 MONTHS AFTER IT WAS REPORTED MISSING. WITNESSES LOCATED NEAR THE ACCIDENT SITE THE NIGHT OF THE ACCIDENT, REPORTED THE MOUNTAINS WERE OBSCURED FROM ABOUT THE 4,000 FOOT LEVEL UP TO THEIR RESPECTIVE TOPS. THEY ALSO REPORTED 'HEAVY' SNOW IN THE AREA THE NIGHT OF THE ACCIDENT. THE PILOT HAD LESS THAN ONE HOUR TOTAL INSTRUMENT FLIGHT TIME AND ABOUT 9 HOURS OF SIMULATED INSTRUMENT TIME.
Probable cause
1) THE PILOT INADEQUATELY EVALUATING THE WEATHER, AND 2) THE PILOT MAKING THE INFLIGHT DECISION TO CONTINUE FLIGHT INTO ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS. FACTORS IN THIS ACCIDENT WERE 1) THE INABILITY OF THE PILOT TO SEE THE MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN DUE TO THE AMBIENT LIGHT CONDITIONS AND OBSCURATIONS, AND 2) THE PILOT'S LACK OF INSTRUMENT FLYING EXPERIENCE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX92FA283
- Event ID
- 20001212X18462
- Case number
- LAX92FA283
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1991-11-15.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 4d0e46415c90cd795dc419696a6c9efc845a97a8ca08af61849d7b817db7d3ea; retrieved 2026-09-21T01:28:22.276Z.