BFO89FA075 · Piper PA-31-350
Piper PA-31-350 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Salisbury Ocean City Wicomico Regional Airport (SBY) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO89FA075
- 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
- 5 · 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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-31-350
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-31
- 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
- N234J
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Salisbury Ocean City Wicomico Regional Airport (SBY), Salisbury, MDTo 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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 collision with object
- 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 › Clearance, not maintained
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, not followed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT UNSUCCESSFULLY TRIED TWICE TO LAND ON RWY 3. HE DID A VISUAL APPROACH AND THEN AN ILS APPROACH. THE PILOT AND WITNESSES REPORTED FOGGY CONDITIONS AT THE AIRPORT. THE PILOT FLEW THE ILS APPROACH AS A THIRD ATTEMPT TO LAND WHEN THE CRASH OCCURRED. RADAR DATA SHOWED THE AIRCRAFT DESENDED TO 1100 FT MSL ON THE APPROACH, ABOUT 1/2 MILE FROM THE RWY. THE PUBLISHED DECISION HEIGHT WAS 1118 FEET. THE RADAR DATA INDICATED THE CFT PASSED EAST OF THE RWY THRESHOLD AT AN ALTITUDE OF 1000 FT MSL. THE NEXT AND LAST RADAR DATA SHOWS THE ACFT ABOUT 2300 FT BEYOND AND 400 FT EAST OF THE RWY. THE INVESTIGATION REVEALED THE AIRCRAFT STRUCK TREES EAST OF THE RWY AND THEN CRASHED IN A CORNFIELD. AN EXAMINATION DID NOT DISCLOSE EVIDENCE OF A MALFUNCTION. THE LANDING GEAR WAS RETRACTED AND THE FLAPS WERE EXTENDED 10 DEGS.
Probable cause
PILOT'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN CLEARANCE FROM OBSTRUCTIONS BECAUSE OF IMPROPER IFR OPERATION. CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT WAS DESCENT BELOW DECISION HEIGHT, DELAY IN INITIATING THE MISSED APPROACH, AND FOG CONDITIONS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO89FA075
- Event ID
- 20001213X29044
- Case number
- BFO89FA075
- 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: a03bb5181b86932e173b481ad4ec70fe36cb44ab5a43c948104bda0b1d889e0d; retrieved 2026-09-18T14:08:12.199Z.