SEA89FA160 · Cessna 152
Snohomish Flying Service Cessna 152 and Beech J35 · Accident: midair collision en route
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's aircraft involved. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA89FA160
- 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
- 4 · 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
Aircraft 1 · Cessna 152
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 152
- 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
- N49231
- Operator
- Snohomish Flying Service
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Harvey Field (S43), Snohomish, WATo 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
- En route · climb to 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
- Midair collision
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Aircraft 2 · Beech J35
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 35
- 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
- N66QB
- Operator
- Richard E. Kehew · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Seattle Paine Field International Airport (PAE), Everett, WATo 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
- 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
- Midair collision
- 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 › Visual lookout, inadequate
- Pilot of other aircraft › Visual lookout, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE C-172, N49231, HAD JUST DEPARTED RWY 32 AT HARVEY FIELD, AN UNCONTROLLED AIRPORT, ON AN INSTRUMENT TRAINING FLIGHT. RADAR DATA SHOWS THAT THE C-172 WAS CLIMBING OUT AT 700-800 FPM AT 65 KTS AND ON A TRUE HEADING OF 310 DEG. THE BE-J35, N66QB, HAD DEPARTED EARLIER FROM PAYNE FIELD AT EVERETT. RADAR DATA SHOWS THAT THE BE-J35 WAS IN LEVEL FLIGHT AT 130 KTS AND ON A TRUE TRACK OF 280 DEG. THE COLLISION OCCURRED AT 1,600 FT MSL IN UNCONTROLLED AIRSPACE. THE CABIN TOP AND LEFT WING OF THE HIGH-WING C-172 DISPLAYED LINEAR SCRATCHES, GOUGES AND PAINT SMEARS WHICH MATCHED THE IMPACT DAMAGE, SCRATCHES AND GOUGES FOUND ON THE BOTTOM SURFACE OF THE LEFT WING OF THE LOW-WING BE-J35. OFFICIAL SUNSET WAS 1 MINUTE AFTER THE ACCIDENT; THE SUN WOULD HAVE BEEN 0.01 DEG ABOVE THE HORIZON AT THE COLLISION ALTITUDE, AND AT A TRUE BEARING OF 284.6 DEG FROM THE ACCIDENT SITE. WITNESSES REPORTED DUSK DARK LIGHT CONDITIONS ON THE GROUND.
Probable cause
THE FAILURE OF THE PILOT OF N66QB, A BEECH J35, TO SEE AND AVOID THIS AIRCRAFT. CONTRIBUTING FACTORS WERE: THE FLIGHT PATH OF THE OTHER AIRCRAFT DIRECTLY INTO THE SETTING SUN, AND THE LOW LIGHT CONDITIONS OF DUSK ON THE GROUND BELOW.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA89FA160
- Event ID
- 20001213X29254
- Case number
- SEA89FA160
- 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 1989-08-30.
- API snapshot SHA-256: b335f783616535c2028189995ae4d29c5f45c8f47cb268c123c313ab1786ff47; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:10:32.711Z.