CHI83FA213 · Mooney M-20-J-201
Mooney M-20-J-201 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From 12C · Rochelle, IL to Tulsa International Airport (TUL)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI83FA213
- 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
Mooney M-20-J-201
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M-20
- 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
- N201GG
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 12C · Rochelle, ILTo Tulsa International Airport (TUL), Tulsa, OK
- 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, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, continued
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Bloomington, IL, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
PRIOR TO THE ACCIDENT, A WITNESS HEARD THE ACFT, THEN SAW IT FOR A SHORT TIME THRU AN OPENING IN THE CLOUDS. IN HIS OPINION, IT WAS HEADING DIRECTLY INTO A THUNDERSTORM, WHICH CONCERNED HIM. HE SAID THAT RAIN WAS FALLING, AND ABOUT 10 MIN LATER, THE THUNDERSTORM PASSED OVER HIS POSITION. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE ACFT CRASHED IN AN OPEN FIELD. THE LEADING EDGES OF BOTH WINGS WERE COMPRESSED BACK IN AN 'ACCORDIAN' MANNER AT AN ANGLE OF ABOUT 45 DEG, WHICH WAS INDICATIVE OF IMPACTING IN A 45 DEG, NOSE LOW ATTITUDE. THERE WAS A SMELL OF FUEL IN THE AREA & NO PREIMPACT MALFUNCTIONS OR FAILURES WERE FOUND. A METEOROLOGICAL STUDY SHOWED THERE WERE VIDEO INTEGRATOR & PROCESSOR (VIP) LEVEL 2 & LEVEL 4 RADAR ECHOS FROM THE THUNDERSTORMS & PROBABLE SEVERE TURBULENCE. A BOTTLE CONTAINING 600 MG OF MOTRIN (IBUPROFEN) WAS FOUND IN THE ACFT, BUT A MEDICAL EXAM REVEALED NO EVIDENCE OF A PHYSIOLOGICAL PROBLEM.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI83FA213
- Event ID
- 20001214X42895
- Case number
- CHI83FA213
- 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: 487c6c552718e15cd7284e3144eef07af382d9019f5dbe5e33cf395e3473644b; retrieved 2026-09-21T06:48:56.699Z.