ATL91LA034 · Piper PA-28-180
Piper PA-28-180 · Accident: in flight collision with object en route
From Gryder-Teague Airport (NC58) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL91LA034
- 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
Piper PA-28-180
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N9685J
- Operator
- Frankey D. Daniels · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Gryder-Teague Airport (NC58), Taylorsville, NCTo not recorded
- 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
- 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
- Wire, transmission
- 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 › Visual lookout, inadequate
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Hickory, NC, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
WHILE ON A LOCAL SIGHTSEEING FLIGHT, THE PILOT HEARD A LOUD 'POW' AND REALIZED THAT THE AIRPLANE HAD COLLIDED WITH A POWER LINE THAT WAS STRUNG ACROSS A RIVER. HE STATED THAT THE AIRPLANE 'PULLED TO THE RIGHT' AFTER THE COLLISION, HOWEVER HE WAS ABLE TO MAINTAIN CONTROL. HE RETURNED TO THE AIRPORT AND LANDED THE AIRPLANE AFTER TWO ATTEMPTS. AN INSPECTION OF THE AIRPLANE REVEALED THAT THE TOP THIRD OF THE VERTICAL STABILIZER AND THE RUDDER HAD SEPARATED FROM THE AIRPLANE. THE POWER LINE WHICH WAS STRUCK WAS REPORTED TO BE ABOUT 40 FEET ABOVE THE SURFACE OF THE WATER. THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE DID NOT REALIZE THAT HE WAS FLYING SO LOW TO THE WATER. THE ACCIDENT WAS REPORTED TO THE FAA BY ANONYMOUS SOURCES; THE PILOT HAD MADE NO ATTEMPT TO REPORT THE ACCIDENT.
Probable cause
THE PILOTS'S INADEQUATE VISUAL LOOKOUT DURING FLIGHT. A FACTOR IN THE ACCIDENT WAS THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN A SAFE ALTITUDE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL91LA034
- Event ID
- 20001212X24723
- Case number
- ATL91LA034
- 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: ad2994c9b579d95c9854eaaf8b353552db6c45cdfe663f087bb46d3f1151d22f; retrieved 2026-09-23T05:04:27.598Z.