ANC99LA077 · Cessna 180A
Cessna 180A · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Denali National Park Airport (PAIN) to Chena Hot Springs Airport (AK13)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC99LA077
- 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
- 0 · 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
Cessna 180A
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 180
- 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
- N5218D
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Denali National Park Airport (PAIN), MCKINLEY PARK, AKTo Chena Hot Springs Airport (AK13), CHENA SPRINGS, AK
- 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
- Approach · VFR go-around
- 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
- 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
- Tree(s)
- 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 › In-flight planning/decision, inadequate
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Fairbanks, AK, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
The certificated airline transport pilot was beginning a landing approach at a private airport. The airport was located in an open area of flat terrain along a creek drainage, surrounded by rising, tree covered terrain. The pilot said he planned to conduct a fly-by inspection of the airport before landing. He turned onto the final approach, and decided to skip the fly-by. He discovered he was high on the glide path, and began a go-around. He indicated he did not analyze a go-around track until he started the maneuver. He began a turn to the left, but the terrain was visually deceiving, and rising steeply. The pilot then turned to the right, but the airplane was unable to out-climb the terrain. The airplane collided with trees, about 1/2 mile west of the airport.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate in-flight planning/decision during a go-around. A factor was the pilot's failure to maintain the proper glide path to the runway.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC99LA077
- Event ID
- 20001212X18914
- Case number
- ANC99LA077
- 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: 603d30a03451ed0ee3e760a4a76b86e96205927d636ca9cf9bab7bacecac0f07; retrieved 2026-09-21T20:30:27.904Z.