ATL88LA255 · Cessna 150
Cessna 150 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From Beaufort, NC (no airport) to Mocksville, NC (no airport)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL88LA255
- 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 150
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 150
- 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
- N7831E
- Operator
- Alpheus B. Bullock · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Beaufort, NC (no airport)To Mocksville, NC (no airport)
- 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 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
- 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 › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › Operation with known deficiencies in equipment, continued
- Pilot in command › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Weather evaluation, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE HAD OBSERVED A CLOUD LAYER FORMING ALONG HIS FLT ROUTE. AT ABOUT THE SAME TIME, THE ACFT VOR RCVR FAILED. THE PLT ELECTED TO CONTINUE VFR-ON-TOP TO HIS PLANNED DESTINATION BASED ON VFR WX REPORTED BY AN ATIS BROADCAST FROM AN ARPT (CLT) WHICH WAS NEAR HIS DESTINATION. UPON ARRIVAL IN THE VICINITY OF HIS DESTINATION, THE COMM RADIO FAILED & HE FOUND THAT THERE WAS A 'SOLID UNDERCAST' PRESENT. HE THEN DIVERTED TO CLT, BUT WAS UNABLE TO LOCATE IT DUE TO THE OVERCAST. WITH AN ESTIMATED 5 MINUTES OF FUEL REMAINING, HE DESCENDED THROUGH THE OVERCAST & BROKE OUT AT 200-300 FT AGL. HE OBSERVED A PAVED ROAD AND ATTEMPTED TO LAND ON IT; THE RT WING IMPACTED UNSEEN UTILITY WIRES DURING THE LDG AND THE AIRPLANE CRASHED. THE PLT STATED THAT HE CHECKED THE WX PRIOR TO T/0 BY LISTENING TO NWS WX RADIO AND BY MAKING A PHONE CALL TO HIS DESTINATION. HE DID NOT OBTAIN A FSS WX BRIEFING. OCCASIONAL LOW OVERCAST CEILINGS WERE FORECAST FOR CLT, BEGINNING A FEW HRS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL88LA255
- Event ID
- 20001213X26766
- Case number
- ATL88LA255
- 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: 19b9c07b9c305f0b184e6b352ea7bbb71e0e31406b20c0f030168c085f4c59c1; retrieved 2026-09-23T08:47:12.546Z.