LAX84FVM02 · Grumman American AA-5B
Grumman American AA-5B · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water on approach
From Gillespie Field (SEE) to Monterey Regional Airport (MRY)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX84FVM02
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Grumman American AA-5B
- Aircraft type
- Grumman American AA-5
- 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
- N1544R
- Operator
- Robert F. Banner · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Gillespie Field (SEE), El Cajon, CATo Monterey Regional Airport (MRY), Monterey, CA
- 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › IFR procedure, not followed
- Pilot in command › Proper altitude, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ACFT COLLIDED WITH HILLY TERRAIN APRX 6 MILES EAST OF THE ARPT DURING THE SECOND ATTEMPTED ILS RWY 10 APCH. THE PLT STATED THAT COMMUNICATION AND NAVIGATION PROBLEMS WERE EXPERIENCED DURING THE FLT. HE ALSO STATED HE CHANGED FUEL TANKS EVERY 1/2 HR DURING THE FLT. A MISSED APCH WAS PERFORMED DURING THE FIRST ILS ATTEMPT BECAUSE THE PLT COULD NOT 'POSITIVELY' IDENTIFY THE RWY THRESHOLD. ON THE 2ND APCH, AFTER OUTER MARKER PASSAGE, THE PLT NOTICED HE WAS BELOW GLIDESLOPE AND NECESSARY ADJUSTMENTS WERE MADE. HE CONTINUED TO STATE THAT AFTER TIME PASSAGE HE NOTICED FULL DOWN GLIDESLOPE DEFLECTION AND MIDDLE MARKER PASSAGE HAD NOT OCCURRED. SHORTLY THEREAFTER, THE ACFT IMPACTED TERRAIN. THE INSTRUMENT PANEL AND RADIO PACK WERE REMOVED FROM THE ACFT BEFORE INVESTIGATORS ARRIVED. THE RT FUEL TANK WAS FOUND EMPTY AND THE LT WAS NEARLY FULL. NO MECHANICAL FAILURE/MALFUNCTION WAS FOUND. RECORDS INDICATE LAST TRANS CHECK WAS 5/9/77, LAST STATIC SYSTEM/ALTIMETER CHECK WAS 5/12/77. LAST VOR TEST COULD NOT BE DETERMINED.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX84FVM02
- Event ID
- 20001214X40754
- Case number
- LAX84FVM02
- 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: 3ed9ed141a1f58a7067be2d42c4e11f18933f55691d574d0fe4979d70a73fc4f; retrieved 2026-09-22T02:09:31.732Z.