NYC89FA053 · Cessna 414
Erie Airways Cessna 414 · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From Erie International Tom Ridge Field (ERI) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC89FA053
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Cessna 414
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 414
- 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
- N244RM
- Operator
- Erie Airways
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Erie International Tom Ridge Field (ERI), Erie, PATo 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
- Maneuvering
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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 › Maneuver, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
BEFORE TAKEOFF, THE CREW INDCD THE FLT WOULD BE FOR 'CHECK RIDES' & THAT THEY PLANNED TO 'SHOOT APPROACHES' & PROCEED TO THE PRACTICE AREA TO DO SOME AIRWORK. ATC ADVISED THE PLTS THAT THE CLOUD BASES WERE AT 3500 FEET MSL. ELEVATION OF THE TERRAIN (WHERE THE ACFT SUBSEQUENTLY CRASHED) WAS 1225 FEET. PRIOR TO THE ACDNT, WITNESSES SAW THE ACFT CIRCLING IN A STEEP TURN AT LOW ALTITUDE. ONE WITNESS RPRTD IT WAS CIRCLING AS IF TO LAND. SUBSEQUENTLY, IT IMPACTED IN A STEEP NOSE DOWN, SLIGHT LEFT WING LOW, ATTITUDE. SEVERAL WITNESSES RPRTD THAT ONE OR BOTH ENGS SPUTTERED BEFORE THE ACFT CRASHED; HOWEVER, AN EXAM OF THE ENGS REVEALED NO INDCN OF A PREIMPACT MALFUNCTION OR FAILURE. AN EXAM OF THE AIRFRAME REVEALED THE LANDING GEAR WAS IN THE EXTENDED POSITION WHEN THE ACFT CRASHED. EXAM OF THE PROPS INDICATED THAT BOTH ENGS WERE PRODUCING AN EQUAL AMOUNT OF POWER. THE AIRWORK TO BE COMPLETED INCLUDED STEEP TURNS, STALLS, AND FLIGHT AT MINIMUM CONTROL AIRSPEED.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC89FA053
- Event ID
- 20001213X27485
- Case number
- NYC89FA053
- 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: 5c85e0c60e0ea6e4a68a5d8646a431af2e8107e378ac03e749722741863efeb2; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:27:07.201Z.