NYC02FA173 · Piper PA-22-108
Piper PA-22-108 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From South Dayton Airport (NY27) to Dart Airport (D79)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC02FA173
- 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
- Unknown
- 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-22-108
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-22
- 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
- N5221Z
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From South Dayton Airport (NY27), South Dayton, NYTo Dart Airport (D79), Mayville, NY
- 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 pattern final
- 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
- Utility pole (marked)
- 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
- Copilot/second pilot › Supervision, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Altitude/clearance, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was owned by the student pilot, who had accumulated approximately 26 hours of total flight experience, which included 24 hours in the accident airplane. He departed on a local flight with a private pilot who had accumulated approximately 605 hours of total flight experience, which included about 450 hours in make and model. The private pilot said the student pilot flew the majority of the flight, and was manipulating the controls during the accident. The student pilot entered the traffic pattern for landing on a 2,750-foot long, turf runway. According to the private pilot, the student pilot's first landing approach was "way too high" and resulted in a go-around. During the second landing attempt, the airplane "seemed right on glide slope," when it "suddenly dropped down" and impacted power lines. The private pilot stated he attempted to reach for the controls and apply engine power, but was too late. The airplane struck the top of a utility pole and power lines, which were located about 250 feet prior to, and in-line with the approach end of the runway. The utility pole was about 40 feet tall, and the wires were marked with "orange balls." The airplane flipped over and came to rest inverted on crops, about 140 feet from the approach end of the runway. The student pilot had not accumulated any "solo" flight experience. The student pilot's flight instructor stated she considered the student pilot a good pilot; however, she had not signed him off for solo flight because of his performance during landing attempts. They had been working on takeoffs and landing for about 6 hours, and she found the student pilot to get "very tense and real nervous" during landings. The private pilot further stated he had known the student pilot for about 30 years and was aware that the student pilot had been receiving flight instruction in the accident airplane.
Probable cause
The student pilot's failure to maintain adequate altitude during the landing approach and the private pilot's inadequate supervision, which resulted in a collision with a marked utility pole. A factor in this accident was the student pilot's lack of experience.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC02FA173
- Event ID
- 20020829X01481
- Case number
- NYC02FA173
- 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, coordinates. 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: e8ab0520bec7106b8aebef304ed63ef957ca633a83f73348b95e7ee0a51553df; retrieved 2026-09-20T19:53:56.046Z.