LAX90FA027 · Cessna R182
Cessna R182 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather on approach
From Van Nuys Airport (VNY) to Brown Field Municipal Airport (SDM)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX90FA027
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Cessna R182
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 182
- 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
- N2257T
- Operator
- Robie E. Ratliff · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Van Nuys Airport (VNY), Van Nuys, CATo Brown Field Municipal Airport (SDM)
- 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
- 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 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
- Visual flight rules (VFR) flight into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC)
- 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 › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Spatial disorientation
- Pilot in command › VFR flight into imc, intentional
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT ATTEMPTED A NIGHT SPECIAL VFR APPROACH TO THE AIRPORT WHEN HE WAS NOT NIGHT CURRENT. HE DID NOT HOLD AN INSTRUMENT RATING. THE PILOT OBTAINED THREE WEATHER REPORTS FOR THE AIRPORT, WHILE EN ROUTE. THESE ESTABLISHED THAT CONDITIONS WERE IFR WITH VISIBILITIES LESS THAN 2 MILES IN FOG. THE PILOT ACCEPTED THE SPECIAL VFR CLEARANCE AND REPORTED INBOUND TO THE AIRPORT FROM THE NORTH. SHORTLY THEREAFTER, HE REPORTED OVER A PRISON, WHICH WAS 4 MILES NORTH EAST OF THE AIRPORT. THE PRISONERS SAID THE AIRCRAFT ORBITED ONE OF THE GUARD TOWERS TWO OR THREE TIMES, THEN DEPARTED TO THE NORTH WEST. THE OFFICIAL VISIBILITY REPORTED BY THE ATCT WAS ONE MILE IN FOG; WITNESSES AT THE PRISON STATED THE GROUND VISIBILITY WAS LESS THAN A MILE WITH AREAS OF HEAVY FOG. THE AIRCRAFT COLLIDED WITH THE GROUND IN A DESCENT MEASURED AT 11 DEGREES WITH A RIGHT WING DOWN ABOUT 20 DEGREES. NO PREIMPACT MECHANICAL MALFUNCTIONS OR FAILURES WERE IDENTIFIED DURING EXAMINATION OF THE WRECKAGE.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S CONTINUED VFR FLIGHT INTO INSTRUMENT METEOROLOGICAL CONDITIONS (IMC), AND HIS FAILURE TO MAINTAIN AIRCRAFT CONTROL AFTER BECOMING SPATIALLY DISORIENTED. FACTORS IN THE ACIDENT WERE: DARKNESS, ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS, AND THE PILOT'S LACK OF INSTRUMENT EXPERIENCE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX90FA027
- Event ID
- 20001213X29813
- Case number
- LAX90FA027
- 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 1989-11-09.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 230889c481f733659aa92017489724601ec8e19a296b9eff7cace9cd5ebda8c5; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:05:24.207Z.