SEA88FA078 · Piper PA-32RT-300T PA-32RT-30
Piper PA-32RT-300T PA-32RT-30 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather on approach
From Olympia Regional Airport (OLM) to William R Fairchild International Airport (CLM)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA88FA078
- 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
- 3 · 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-32RT-300T PA-32RT-30
- 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
- N36815
- Operator
- James Stanley Bell
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Olympia Regional Airport (OLM), Olympia, WATo William R Fairchild International Airport (CLM)
- 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
- 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 encounter with weather
- 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
- Visual flight rules (VFR) flight into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC)
- 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 › Altitude, inadequate
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › VFR flight into imc, continued
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DRG ARR, THE FLT WAS HANDED OFF TO WHIDBEY ISLAND APCH CTL AT WHIDBEY ISLAND (NUW) NAVAL AIR STN (NAS). NUW WAS 35 MI NE OF THE DESTN (FAIRCHILD INTL ARPT/CLM), AT PORT ANGELES, WHICH HAD NO OPERG CTL TWR. THE PLT WAS GIVEN THE NUW WX, WHICH WAS 400 SCAT, ESTD 2600' OVC, VIS 6 MI WITH FOG. THE FLT WAS VECTORED TOWARD CLM & WAS CLRD TO DSCND TO THE MIN VECTORING ALT OF 1000' MSL OVER THE STRAITS OF JUAN DE FUCA. THE PLT RPRTD THE ARPT BEACON IN SIGHT & CANCELLED HIS IFR CLNC. THE ACFT WAS OBSERVED TO FLY OVER THE ARPT AT LOW ALT ON A SW HEADING. THE UNICOM OPERATOR ASKED THE PLT FOR A CEILING RPRT, BUT THE PLT REPLIED THAT HE WAS UNABLE TO DETERMINE THE CEILING DUE TO FOG. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE ACFT CRASHEDON RISING TERRAIN ABOUT 2 MI SSW OF THE ARPT, WHILE IN A LEVEL TURN AT AN ELEV OF 1300'. THE 0505 PDT WX AT CLM WAS ESTD 500' BRKN, 4000' OVC, VIS 6 MI WITH FOG. THE CTLR RPRTD THAT ON INITIAL CONTACT WITH THE FLT, THE 0505 WX FOR CLM WAS NOT YET AVAILABLE ON HIS WX VISION SCREEN. THE ARPT ELEV AT CLM WAS 290'.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA88FA078
- Event ID
- 20001213X25568
- Case number
- SEA88FA078
- 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: 5bde98792300ec28928ddc53e20a2da2f57d5ec24c2bb8722f5760fbbb4cf62d; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:45:20.905Z.