DEN87FA162 · Cessna 421C
Cessna 421C · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water while maneuvering
From White Sulphur Springs Airport (7S6) to Casper, WY
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN87FA162
- 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
Cessna 421C
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 421
- 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
- N26553
- Operator
- Hugo Schoellkopf
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From White Sulphur Springs Airport (7S6), WHT SULPHR SPRG, MTTo Casper, WY
- 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
- 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 attained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT & 3 PAXS WERE RETURNING TO DALLAS, TX FROM A RETREAT IN MONTANA. THE PLT FILED AN IFR FLT PLAN FROM WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, MT, TO CASPER, WY, BUT DID NOT ACTIVATE IT AFTER DEPARTURE. THE ACFT WAS RPRTD OVERDUE BY FAMILY & A SEARCH WAS INITIATED. THE WRECKAGE WAS LOCATED BY THE CIVIL AIR PATROL ON 7/1/87. THE ACFT HAD CRASHED AT THE 10,000' LVL OF A BOX CANYON AREA IN MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN. THE IMPACT AREA WAS ON A ROLLING MEADOW THAT WAS SURROUNDED ON THREE SIDES BY MOUNTAINS. ENTRANCE TO THE AREA WAS FROM THE NNE. THERE WAS EVIDENCE THE ACFT IMPACTED IN A LEFT WING LOW, NOSE LOW ATTITUDE, AFTER TURNING TO A HDG OF ABOUT 050 DEG. BEFORE TAKEOFF, THE PLT HAD ADDED 35 GAL OF FUEL (MIXTURE OF 80 & 100 OCTANE FUEL) FOR AN ESTIMATED FUEL LOAD OF 213 GAL. NO EVIDENCE WAS FOUND OF A PREIMPACT MECHANICAL FAILURE OR MALFUNCTION. APPROX 27 MI SSE OF CODY, WY, THE WX WAS IN PART: 18,000' SCATTERED, 25,000' OVERCAST, 30 MI VIS. THE ELEV AT CODY WAS ABOUT 5,000' LOWER THAN THE CRASH SITE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN87FA162
- Event ID
- 20001213X31165
- Case number
- DEN87FA162
- 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: e963c34e1b8147bdf9da0f96ceaf382a0d0853fad243dc9177517f4c9986d7bf; retrieved 2026-09-21T04:05:35.179Z.