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NYC91LA043 · Cessna 210L

5 Dec 1990 · New Haven, CT, United States

Shoreline Aviation Cessna 210L · Accident: on ground/water collision with object during landing

From Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT) to Tweed New Haven Airport (HVN)

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Event

NTSB case
NYC91LA043
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 210L

Aircraft type
Cessna 210
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
N5280V
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT), Pittsburgh, PATo Tweed New Haven Airport (HVN), New Haven, CT
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
Landing · landing roll
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
On ground/water collision with object
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

  • Driver of vehicle › Monitoring, inadequate

Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of New Haven, CT, the place the record names. Not the accident site.

NTSB narrative

DRG FLT, THE PLT NOTED A NEGATIVE READING ON THE AMMETER & CYCLED THE ALTERNATOR SW, BUT TO NO AVAIL. BEFORE LNDG, SHE ACTIVATED THE RWY LGTS & DISCUSSED THE WNDS WITH A DEPG PLT. A COMPLETE ELEC FAILURE OF THE ACFT OCCURRED AS IT WAS ON DOWNWIND TO LND AFTER THE TWR HAD CLOSED. CONSEQUENTLY, ALL EXTERNAL LGTG & COM RADIO IN THE ACFT WERE INOP. A VEHICLE DRIVER WAS MAKING A RQRD INSPN ON RWY 32. THE DRIVER SAID SHE MONITORED THE TWR FREQ USING A HAND HELD RADIO & HEARD A DISCUSION, BUT DIDN'T HEAR EXACTLY WHAT WAS SAID. SHE SAW THE RWY LIGHTS ILLUMINATE, BUT THOUGHT THEY WERE ACTVTD BY THE DEPG ACFT. SHE ANNOUNCED HER FLD PSN & INTENTIONS USING THE GND CTL FREQ. THE PLT LNDD THE ACFT ON RWY 20 & BGN THE ROLLOUT AS THE VEHICLE DRIVER WAS ON RWY 32, CROSSING RWY 20. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE ACFT & VEHICLE COLLIDED AT THE RWY INTXN. THE ACFT'S ALTERNATOR & VOLTAGE REGULATOR WERE REMOVED & TESTED, BUT BOTH WERE FND TO BE OPNL. THE OVERVOLTAGE UNIT WAS NOT RECOVERED & THE REASON FOR THE LOSS OF ELEC PWR WAS NOT VERIFIED.

Probable cause

THE FAILURE OF THE VEHICLE DRIVER TO ADEQUATELY MONITOR THE RADIO/TRAFFIC PATTERN. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: DARKNESS, THE AIRCRAFT'S LOSS OF ELECTRICAL POWER AFTER ACTIVATING THE RUNWAY LIGHTS AND ENTERING THE PATTERN, AND THE LACK OF VISUAL PERCEPTION CONCERNING BOTH THE VEHICLE DRIVER AND THE PILOT.

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record NYC91LA043
Event ID
20001212X24806
Case number
NYC91LA043
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 1990-12-06.
  • API snapshot SHA-256: 824ccd48cd831400ec6f6db35ff1b48839fc5db6f0f5d6558e33518c3c5332da; retrieved 2026-09-21T23:41:35.441Z.