FLIGHT FINDINGSAVIATION OCCURRENCE MAP
Back to map

ATL87LA259 · Cessna 150G

15 Sept 1987 · Concord, NC, United States

Cessna 150G · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route

From Goose Creek Airport (28A) to an unrecorded destination

Show on map Search Wikipedia NTSB source dataset
Report a problem

Event

NTSB case
ATL87LA259
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
0 · 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 150G

Aircraft type
Cessna 150
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
N2280J
Operator
Jim Bezanson
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Goose Creek Airport (28A), Matthews, NCTo 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
In flight encounter with weather
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

  • Flight instructor(on ground) › Preflight planning/preparation, poor
  • Pilot in command › Became lost/disoriented, inadvertent
  • Pilot in command › Navigation receiver, not used
  • Pilot in command › Unsuitable terrain or takeoff/landing/taxi area, selected

Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

WHILE ON CLIMBOUT, THE STU PLT SWITCHED RADIOS TO THE DEST UNICOM FREQ. UNABLE TO CONTACT ANYONE ON THAT FREQ, THE DEPARTURE ARPT FREQ WAS RESELECTED. NO CONTACT WAS ESTABLISHED ON THIS FREQ SO THE STU PLT ATTEMPTED TO RTRN TO THE ARPT. THE HAZE WAS VERY THICK AND THE DEPARTURE ARPT WAS OVERFLOWN. AFTER ABOUT 30 MIN IT BECAME APPARENT THAT THE STU PLT WAS DISORIENTED. FOLLOWING PREVIOUS INSTRUCTIONS TO LAND PRIOR TO RUNNING OUT OF FUEL OR FLYING INTO NIGHT CONDITIONS, THE STU PLT STARTED LOOKING FOR A SUITABLE FIELD TO ACCOMPLISH THE OFF ARPT LANDING. REPORTEDLY THE ENG BEGAN TO RUN ROUGH DURING THIS SEARCH. AN APPROACH WITH AVAILABLE POWER WAS MADE TO A SOFT FIELD. UPON APPLICATION OF BRAKES, THE ACFT NOSED OVER. EXAMINATION OF THE ACFT REVEALED A VOICE ACTIVATED HEADSET AND AN UNLABELED SWITCH WHICH CONTROLLED COMMUNICATION OUTSIDE THE ACFT. THE NAVIGATION RADIO WAS NOT SET TO EITHER OF THE THREE VOR'S WITHIN RANGE. A WRITE-UP EARLIER IN THE DAY FOR THE ACFT STATED THAT THE COM RADIO WOULD NOT TRANSMIT.

Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record ATL87LA259
Event ID
20001213X32007
Case number
ATL87LA259
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: b95a9930eb493ccf9a9f23abd8da75668bdeae79c94823722d18877f2334f61b; retrieved 2026-09-22T00:44:22.516Z.