ANC87FA153 · Piper PA-12
Piper PA-12 · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From DRY CREEK, AK to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC87FA153
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Piper PA-12
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-12
- 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
- N3140M
- Operator
- David Mccarter
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From DRY CREEK, AKTo 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
- Approach · VFR pattern base
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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 › Airspeed(vs), not maintained
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, poor
Not plotted · Location withheld: coordinates are missing, conflicting, invalid, or have no accepted acquisition method. No substitute location has been invented.
NTSB narrative
THE PRIVATE PILOT WAS TRANSPORTING PASSENGERS INCIDENTAL TO THE OPERATION OF HIS LODGE. ACCORDING TO WITNESSES, IT WAS COMMON FOR PILOTS TO USE THAT PORTION OF THE HIGHWAY FOR TAKEOFFS AND LANDINGS. ACCORDING TO THE HUSBAND OF ONE OF THE FATALLY INJURED PASSENGERS, THE PILOT WAS PLANNING TO LAND ON THE HIGHWAY, JUST AS HE HAD DONE PREVIOUSLY. ANOTHER WITNESS STATED THE AIRPLANE WAS PARALLELING THE HIGHWAY AND MADE A RIGHT TURN TOWARDS THE ROAD AND THE HILL. THE AIRPLANE THEN 'WOBBLED' SLIGHTLY, AND THEN DOVE TOWARD THE ROAD WITH THE RIGHT WING LOW. THE AIRPLANE IMPACTED APPROXIMATELY 20 YARDS IN FRONT OF A TRACTOR TRAILER ON THE HIGHWAY. THE AIRPLANE BURST INTO FLAMES AND SLID INTO THE DITCH ALONGSIDE OF THE HIGHWAY.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC87FA153
- Event ID
- 20001213X31956
- Case number
- ANC87FA153
- 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 1987-09-16.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 37ca6cb1dd3784e2ea448196d57b82e03e17d03f6c935297b2c5cf7fcbe0cc98; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:58:41.169Z.