CHI88FA090 · Piper PA-32-300
Piper PA-32-300 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Wayne County Airport (BJJ) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI88FA090
- 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
Piper PA-32-300
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-32
- 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
- N32076
- Operator
- Winston N. Bloch JR · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Wayne County Airport (BJJ), Wooster, OHTo 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
- Approach · IFR final approach
- 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
- 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 › Decision height, not maintained
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, improper
- Pilot in command › Proper alignment, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DRG A NIGHT ARRIVAL, THE PLT WAS CLEARED FOR AN ILS RWY 4 APCH AFTER BEING ADZD THE SKY WAS PARTIALLY OBSCURED, MEASUREDCEILING 200' OVERCAST, VIS 1/2 MI WITH FOG, WIND 080 AT 17 KTS. MINS FOR THE APCH WERE 200' CEILING & 1/2 MI VIS. THE PLT WAS CLEARED TO BEGIN THE APCH FROM A 7 MI DME ARC. AS THE ACFT DESCENDED ON THE APCH, RADAR CONTACT WAS LOST & THE PLT WAS CLEARED TO CONTACT QUINCY RADIO. AS THE PLT RPRTD PASSING THE QUINCY VOR (JUST SHORT OF THE ILS OUTER MARKER/FINAL APCH FIX), THE FSS SPECIALIST ADVISED HIM THE VIS HAD DROPPED TO 3/8 MI. AFTER THE PLT RPRTD PASSING THE OUTER MARKER, RADIO CONTACT WAS LOST, EXCEPT FOR THE SOUND OF A KEYED MIKE. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE ACFT HIT TREES & CRASHED WELL LEFT OF THE ILS CENTERLINE, APRX 3/10 MI WEST FROM THE APCH END OF RWY 4. NO PRE-ACDNT MALFUNCTION OR FAILURE OF THE ACFT OR ILS FACILITY WAS FOUND.
Probable cause
DESCENT BELOW THE DH BY THE PILOT IN COMMAND DURING AN INSTRUMENT APPROACH INTO KNOWN ADVERSE WEATHER RATHER THEN PROCEEDING TO A SUITABLE ALTERNATE DESTINATION.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI88FA090
- Event ID
- 20001213X25424
- Case number
- CHI88FA090
- 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 1988-04-02.
- API snapshot SHA-256: bd52489a6bfa5de6dcb0cc1e5fb32b9e1a549604f40fd7018a783f0d39fd703f; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:46:28.073Z.