DEN85LA112 · Piper PA-32RT-300T PA-32RT-30
Piper PA-32RT-300T PA-32RT-30 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From BZM · Bozeman, MT to Havre City County Airport (HVR)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN85LA112
- 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
- Unknown
Piper PA-32RT-300T PA-32RT-30
- 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
- N21092
- Operator
- Maurice Klabunde
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From BZM · Bozeman, MTTo Havre City County Airport (HVR), Havre, MT
- 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 · 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
- Pilot in command › Aircraft handling, inattentive
- Pilot in command › Clearance, not maintained
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Garneill, MT, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT REPORTED THAT DURING A NIGHT X-COUNTRY FLT, HE ENCOUNTERED MARGINAL (OBSCURED) WX & REVERSED COURSE TO RETURN TO THE DEPARTURE POINT. HE STATED THAT WHILE HE WAS RETURNING, HE 'DOZED OFF A LITTLE BIT' & WHEN HE AWOKE, HE SAW A MOUNTAIN DIRECTLY AHEAD. HE TOOK EVASIVE ACTION BY PULLING THE ACFT UP, BUT THE ACFT PANCAKED INTO THE MOUNTAIN. REPORTEDLY, THE PLT WAS TIRED, & WHILE RETURNING, HE RELAXED & MOMENTARILY FELL ASLEEP.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN85LA112
- Event ID
- 20001214X36159
- Case number
- DEN85LA112
- 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 1985-04-06.
- API snapshot SHA-256: feddac7d63e9efbd3bcdc47134b20b8a965d2727876669d9bb0eda22ea24340b; retrieved 2026-09-21T17:19:36.354Z.