South Arero Cessna 210M accident
Cessna 210M · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water en route
From Albuquerque International Sunport (ABQ) to Cavern City Air Terminal (CNM)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN92FA016
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Unknown
Cessna 210M
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 210
- 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
- N1231M
- Operator
- South Arero
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Albuquerque International Sunport (ABQ), Albuquerque, NMTo Cavern City Air Terminal (CNM), Carlsbad, NM
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- 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 › Altitude, inadequate
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Albuquerque, NM, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT WAS ON HIS 1ST FLT WITH THE ALL CARGO PART 135 OPERATOR. HE DID NOT HAVE A PART 135 IFR CHECK & WAS TO FLY VFR ON THIS FLT. HE WAS BRIEFED BY THE CHIEF PLT TO FLY RWY HDG AFTER DEPG RWY 12 AT ALBUQUERQUE INTL ARPT & TO CLIMB TO 9500 FT, WHICH WOULD HAVE GIVEN HIM TRRN CLNC WHILE FLYING THRU A PASS. THIS WOULD HAVE ALSO GIVEN A MINIMUM OF 1000 FT CLNC BELOW THE CLOUDS, WHICH WERE RPRTD AS 11,000 OVC. AFTER TAKEOFF, ACCORDING TO THE RADAR PLOT, THE PLT TURNED RGT & PROCEEDED OUT THE APRX PATH CORRESPONDING TO THE 120 DEG RADIAL OF THE ALBUQUERQUE VORTAC. HIS ALTITUDE WAS 9500 FT, ACCORDING TO THE TRANSPONDER MODE 'C' READOUT. ACCORDING TO THE RADAR PLOT, THE ACFT MAINTAINED THIS APRX PATH & ALTITUDE UNTIL COLLISION WITH A 10,600 FT MTN, WHICH WAS LOCATED SOUTH OF THE FLT PATH THAT THE PLT WAS BRIEFED TO FLY. THE PLT HAD RCVD NO TRAINING FROM THE COMPANY, NOR WAS ANY REQD BY FAA REGULATIONS, SINCE HE CAME ABOARD WITH A CURRENT PART 135 CHECK.
Probable cause
INSUFFICIENT TERRAIN CLEARANCE ALTITUDE SELECTED BY THE PILOT IN COMMAND.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN92FA016
- Event ID
- 20001212X18581
- Case number
- DEN92FA016
- 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: fd2e4da50015a6dfde6304360fab3b6d09b22e8aee883a5b77baa390df38f86d; retrieved 2026-09-18T14:01:02.883Z.