NYC00FA225 · Grumman American AA-5
Grumman American AA-5 · Accident: loss of control in flight en route
From Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport (ITH) to Schenectady County Airport (SCH)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC00FA225
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Grumman American AA-5
- Aircraft type
- Grumman American AA-5
- 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
- N9570L
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport (ITH), Ithaca, NYTo Schenectady County Airport (SCH), Schenectady, NY
- 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 control in flight
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The day before the accident the pilot purchased the airplane. The next day, he departed on a cross-country flight to ferry the airplane home. On the flight prior to the accident, the pilot landed at the wrong airport without a clearance. Once on the ground, the pilot apologized to the tower controller, and advised the controller that he was out of fuel. The airplane was serviced and then departed on the accident flight. A witness at the accident site heard the airplane fly low over his house. He then heard an increase in engine rpm, which last about 2 seconds, and ended with a 'thud.' Weather at the site during the time of the accident was rainy, foggy, and dark, with the base of the clouds about treetop level. The pilot had no recent night flight experience, and did not hold an instrument rating. Examination of the airframe and engine revealed no preimpact failures or malfunctions that would have contributed to the accident.
Probable cause
The pilot's improper decision to continue the flight into deteriorating weather, which resulted in his failure to maintain control of the airplane. Factors in the accident were the dark night, fog, low ceiling, and the pilot's inadequate preflight planning.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC00FA225
- Event ID
- 20001212X21822
- Case number
- NYC00FA225
- 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 2000-08-12.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 6dfff1b7450900ca95a3bc21c5207d1b784eaae598b4b231d6b18b4ece065655; retrieved 2026-09-20T20:57:14.051Z.