ATL84LA176 · Cessna 172N
Cessna 172N · Accident en route
From Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport (BHM) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL84LA176
- 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 172N
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N734ZP
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport (BHM), Birmingham, ALTo 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 · 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
- Miscellaneous/other
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Incapacitation(loss of consciousness)
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT MADE A FLT OF ABOUT 30 MIN TO PRACTICE LANDINGS, THEN LANDED TO PICK UP 2 PASSENGERS. ABOUT 10 MIN AFTER TAKING OFF ON THE 2ND FLT, HE BEGAN HAVING SYMPTOMS OF A MEDICAL PROBLEM. HE SAID HE FELT HOT & THE AIR FELT STAGNANT & STALE. THE VENTS & A WINDOW WERE OPENED & HE BEGAN RETURNING TO THE ARPT. HE ATTEMPTED TO TUNE THE RADIO, BUT COULD NOT FIND THE FREQ. SEVERAL TIMES, HE BLACKED OUT & REGAINED CONSCIOUSNESS. A SHORT TIME BEFORE THE ACCIDENT, A WITNESS SAW THE ACFT FLYING VERY LOW. HE STATED THAT THE PLT WAS 'WORKING THE THROTTLE & DIPPING THE PLANE' BUT REPORTED THE ENG RAN SMOOTH AT HI & LOW POWER. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE ACFT COLLIDED WITH TREES & CRASHED. ALL 3 OCCUPANTS WERE TRANSPORTED TO A HOSPITAL. THE PLT'S MEDICAL PROBLEM WAS DIAGNOSED AS VASOVAGAL SYNCOPE. REPORTEDLY, SIMILAR EPISODES BEGAN WHEN THE PLT WAS 14 TO 15 YRS OLD & THE EPISODES HAD BEEN ASSOCIATED WITH EXTREME NERVOUSNESS, SWEATING & PALPITATIONS. THE PLT'S MEDICAL CERTIFICATE WAS DATED 3/3/82.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL84LA176
- Event ID
- 20001214X39480
- Case number
- ATL84LA176
- 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: 03639373e98e186eeda22fdd087400bb7186f5eda9edffc805d3f42d2ee45a48; retrieved 2026-09-21T17:36:19.656Z.