ANC90FA158 · Cessna 414
Cessna 414 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water en route
From Sitka Rocky Gutierrez Airport (SIT) to Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport (ANC)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC90FA158
- 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
- 2 · 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 414
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 414
- 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
- N8180K
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sitka Rocky Gutierrez Airport (SIT), Sitka, AKTo Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport (ANC), Anchorage, 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
- En route · climb to 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 › Clearance, not maintained
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, not followed
- Pilot in command › Planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT RECEIVED A WEATHER BRIEFING AND FILED AN IFR FLIGHT PLAN FROM SITKA TO ANCHORAGE, ALASKA. DURING TAKEOFF FROM RUNWAY 11 AT SITKA, HE PROVIDED A PIREP TO THE FLIGHT SERVICE STATION, SAYING THAT HE HAD ENTERED THE CLOUD BASES AT 700 FT MSL. WHILE DEPARTING, A LEFT TURN WAS MADE, AND THE AIRPLANE CRASHED ON MOUNT VERSTOVIA AT THE 1420 FT LEVEL, APPROXIMATELY 3 MILES EAST OF THE AIRPORT. AN ON-SCENE INVESTIGATION REVEALED THE AIRPLANE STRUCK WOODED TERRAIN WHILE CLIMBING ON A HEADING OF 359 DEG. SEVERAL TREE LIMBS HAD BEEN CLEAN CUT (BY THE PROPELLERS); WRECKAGE WAS SPREAD OVER A 516 FT AREA. A STANDARD INSTRUMENT DEPARTURE (SITKA 5 SID) WAS AVAILABLE WHICH WOULD HAVE PROVIDED TERRAIN CLEARANCE WITH A RIGHT TURN-OUT FROM RUNWAY 11 TO AN INITIAL CLIMB HEADING OF 280 DEG.
Probable cause
IMPROPER PLANNING/DECISION BY THE PILOT, AND HIS FAILURE TO FOLLOW IFR PROCEDURES AND MAINTAIN CLEARANCE FROM MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC90FA158
- Event ID
- 20001212X23851
- Case number
- ANC90FA158
- 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: 30800a2301e6ef0f9c6ff0ac3d1572f2a738313ecbf40f12aa119e131def59bd; retrieved 2026-09-21T02:18:21.421Z.