CHI00FA003 · Beech D-45
Beech D-45 and Beech T-34 · Accident: midair collision while maneuvering
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI00FA003
- 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
- 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
Aircraft 1 · Beech D-45
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft D-45
- 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
- N300SH
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Naper Aero Club Airport (LL10), Naperville, ILTo CGX · Chicago, IL
- 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
- Maneuvering · turn to reverse direction
- 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
- Midair collision
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Aircraft 2 · Beech T-34
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft T-34
- 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
- N5367G
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Naper Aero Club Airport (LL10), Naperville, ILTo CGX · Chicago, IL
- 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
- Maneuvering · turn to reverse direction
- 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
- Midair collision
- 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
- Other institution › Procedure inadequate
- Pilot in command › Visual lookout, not obtained
- Pilot of other aircraft › Visual lookout, not obtained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
N300SH, a Beech D-45, was destroyed on impact with terrain following a midair collision with N5367G, a Beech T-34, during a practice maneuver by the Lima Lima Flying Squadron. Both aircraft departed in sequence from 6-ship delta formation to perform a maneuver called a pop top break. The pop top break involved each aircraft to depart from the formation in sequence by entering a climbing 180-degree turn to follow the lead aircraft in trail. The narrow area of the human eye's visual field is approximately 10-15 degrees. A video tape of the accident flight shows a delayed entry into the turn by the D-45 relative to the T-34's entry into the maneuver. The pilot of the T-34 stated that he did not see the D-45 prior to the midair collision. The Lima Lima Flying Squadron did not have procedures in place to recover or adjust for maneuvers that were not successful.
Probable cause
the visual lookout not obtained by the pilot of the Beech T-34 and the inadequate procedure by the Lima Lima Flying Squadron. The delayed entry into the maneuver by the pilot of the Beech D-45 was a contributing factor.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI00FA003
- Event ID
- 20001212X19911
- Case number
- CHI00FA003
- 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: 7fd402b49261178d729ab055af99116127eaf35efa4998531e05efa450f7afff; retrieved 2026-09-20T21:44:40.808Z.