NYC86FA111 · Piper PA-28-140
Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: undershoot on approach
From N24 · Spring Valley, NY to N24 · Spring Valley, NY
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC86FA111
- 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
Piper PA-28-140
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N44331
- Operator
- Vincent Rovito/Geo.Victorov
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From N24 · Spring Valley, NYTo N24 · Spring Valley, NY
- 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 final
- 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
- Undershoot
- 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
- Tree(s)
- 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 › Altitude, misjudged
- Pilot in command › Clearance, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Distance, misjudged
- Wing › Separation
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PAX STATED THAT HE & THE PLT WERE AT A BAR WHERE THEY HAD ABOUT THREE BEERS RPIOR TO THIS FLIGHT. DURING THE FLIGHT THE PILOT DID SEVERAL STALLS AND SOME AEROBATIC MANEUVERS. THE PAX WAS UNNERVED AND TOLD THE PLT THAT HE WANTED TO RETURN TO THE ARPT. DURING THE FINAL APCH LEG TO THE ARPT THE PLT UNDERSHOT THE RWY AND THE ACFT COLLIDED WITHTREES LOCATED ABOUT 475 FT FROM AND BELOW THE ELEVATION OF THE RWY. A WITNESS SAW THE ACFT APCH THE ARPT IN A NORMAL MANNER WITH THE ENGINE RUNNING BEFORE THE COLLISION. THE PLT WAS COMATOSE FOR SEVERAL DAYS AFTERWARDS AND HAS NO RECOLLECTION OF THE ACCIDENT. THE PAX REPORTED NO PROBLEM WITH THE ACFT BEFORE THE ACCIDENT. EXAM OF THE ACFT DID NOT DISCLOSE EVIDENCE OF MALFUNCTION. THE BAROMETERIC PRESSURE WAS 29.75. THE ALTIMETER WAS SET TO 30.40. ACCORDING TO THE PLT'S LOGBOOK, THE PLT'S LAST FLT AND LAST NIGHT FLT WERE RESPECTIVELY 6 AND 5.5 MONTHS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT DATE. A BLOOD ALCOHOL TEST WAS NOT PERFORMED ON THE PLT BECAUSE OF HIS INJURIES.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC86FA111
- Event ID
- 20001213X33392
- Case number
- NYC86FA111
- 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 1986-04-23.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 12963ddab2ebcdae5900449a007b05a6da97bff7a90b273ce782931078112f5f; retrieved 2026-09-21T16:59:57.572Z.