ANC89FA090 · Bellanca 17-30
Bellanca 17-30 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water en route
From Fairbanks International Airport (FAI) to Valdez Pioneer Field (VDZ)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC89FA090
- 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
- Unknown
Bellanca 17-30
- Aircraft type
- Bellanca 17
- 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
- CGLJM
- Operator
- David Evans
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Fairbanks International Airport (FAI), Fairbanks, AKTo Valdez Pioneer Field (VDZ), Valdez, AK
- 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 collision with terrain/water
- 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 › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › Proper altitude, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT RCVD A WX BRIEFING EARLIER IN THE DAY. DURING A DEPARTURE FROM FAIRBANKS, AK, HE REQUESTED STAGE II RADAR SERVICE TO THE SOUTH, EN ROUTE TO VALDEZ, AK. THE ACFT NEVER ARRIVED AT VALDEZ. ON 7/12/89, IT WAS LOCATED WHERE IT HAD CRASHED AT AN ELEVATION OF ABOUT 7000 FT, NEAR THE TOP OF A MTN RIDGE. IMPACT OCCURRED ON THE NORTH SIDE OF THE MTN ON STEEP SNOW COVERED TERRAIN IN A BOX CANYON AREA. AN EXAM OF THE WRECKAGE INDCD THE LANDING GEAR WAS RETRACTED DURING IMPACT. THE PROP WAS NOT FOUND, BUT 4 PROP ATTACH BOLTS WERE FOUND THAT HAD BEEN SHEARED. APRX 37 MI WEST AT HEALY RIVER (ELEVATION 1294 FT), THE 1945 ADT WX WAS IN PART: 5000 FT SCATTERED, 12,000 FT SCATTERED, 18,000 FT THIN BROKEN, VISIBITY 35 MI. ABOUT 115 MI SOUTHEAST AT GULKANA (ELEVATION 1578) THE 1952 ADT SKY CONDITION WAS: 5000 FT SCATTERED, 8000 FT BROKEN.
Probable cause
IMPROPER IN-FLIGHT PLANNING/DECISION BY THE PILOT, AND HIS FAILURE TO MAINTAIN SUFFICIENT ALTITUDE WHILE ENTERING A BOX CANYON AND/OR CROSSING MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN IN RESTRICTED WEATHER CONDITION. THE TERRAIN AND WEATHER WERE RELATED FACTORS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC89FA090
- Event ID
- 20001213X28448
- Case number
- ANC89FA090
- 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 1989-06-08.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 28681ba00116339f3537d05f1d3ff5a56262274b355503c9d68c6b45c640d917; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:17:48.122Z.