SEA83FA127 · Piper PA-24-250
Piper PA-24-250 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Twisp Municipal Airport (2S0) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA83FA127
- 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
- 2 · 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-24-250
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-24
- 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
- N47RR
- Operator
- Calvin A Merriman · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Twisp Municipal Airport (2S0), Twisp, WATo 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
- Approach · VFR go-around
- 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 object
- 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 › Go-around, delayed
- Pilot in command › Proper climb rate, not attained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ACFT CRASHED INTO TREES AT THE DEPARTURE END OF THE RWY DURING A GO-AROUND. THE PILOT HAD ATTEMPTED A LANDING ON RWY34 WITH FULL FLAPS. POWER WAS CUT ON FINAL OVER THE TREES AT 75 MPH. WHEN TOUCHDOWN HAD NOT BEEN ACCOMPLISHED ABOUT HALFWAY DOWN THE RWY THE PILOT DECIDED TO GO AROUND. THE WINDS WERE LIGHT AND VARIABLE. FULL THROTTLE WAS ADDED BUT THE ACFTFAILED TO CLEAR THE TREES AND CRASHED. ALL OCCUPANTS WERE EJECTED FROM THE ACFT DURING THE CRASH. THE FRONT SEAT OCCUPANTS WERE SERIOUSLY INJURED THEIR SURVIVAL ENHANCED BY THE USE OF SEAT BELTS. THE REAR SEAT PASSENGERS SUSTAINED FATAL INJURIES. THEIR SEAT BELTS WERE NOT FASTENED. THE ACFT WAS DESTROYED, THE FUSELAGE SPLIT AND SEPARATED INTO TWO PARTS WHICH ALLOWED OCCUPANT EJECTION. THE PILOT STATED IN A TELEPHONE INTERVIEW THAT HE EXPERIENCED NO POWERPLANT OR CONTROL MALFUNCTIONS BUT THAT THE ACFT SEEMED TO 'MUSH' AFTER INITIAL ACCELERATION AND CLIMB.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA83FA127
- Event ID
- 20001214X43523
- Case number
- SEA83FA127
- 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: 2e0920fa5c779f2d6ddb633d6fa76802b7e852be742795917bc63d6e100cdf31; retrieved 2026-09-21T06:38:47.445Z.