NYC87FA262 · Piper PA-32-300
Paragon Flying Club Piper PA-32-300 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water on approach
From Chicago Executive Airport (PWK) to Williamsport Regional Airport (IPT)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC87FA262
- 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
- 1 · 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
Piper PA-32-300
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-32
- 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
- N38364
- Operator
- Paragon Flying Club
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Chicago Executive Airport (PWK), Wheeling, ILTo Williamsport Regional Airport (IPT), Williamsport, PA
- 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 · IFR missed 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 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 › Missed approach, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT INITIATED THE ILS APPROACH AND ACKNOWLEDGED A FREQUENCY CHANGE. THE ACFT WAS FOUND ON A STEEP HILL ONE MILE SOUTH OF THE AIRPORT. NO EVIDENCE OF AN ENGINE OR CONTROL SYSTEM MALFUNCTION WAS FOUND. IT APPEARED THAT THE PILOT MADE A MISSED APPROACH AND FLEW INTO HIGH TERRAIN. THERE WAS A 2 1/2 HOUR DELAY BETWEEN THE TIME OF THE CRASH AND CONFIRMATION OF THE CRASH. THE PILOT WAS FOUND OUTSIDE OF THE WRECKAGE APPROXIMATELY 5 HOURS LATER. AN AME SAID THE CRASH WAS SURVIVABLE AND THAT THE PILOT HAD EXITED THE AIRCRAFT ON HIS OWN AFTER THE ACCIDENT. HE SAID THAT ALTHOUGH THE PILOT EXPERIENCED SERIOUS INJURIES, NONE OF THEM WERE LETHAL. THE TEMPERATURE DROPPED TO 46 DEGREES WITH A WIND CHILL TEMPERATURE OF 36 DEGREES DURING THE NIGHT. THE AUTOPSY SHOWED THE PILOT HAD DIED OF EXPOSURE AND SHOCK.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC87FA262
- Event ID
- 20001213X32185
- Case number
- NYC87FA262
- 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: fdb57e4a7f468602c2c8d57a46d8863ceba583c5dedb910f34bef08413e25b53; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:58:07.478Z.