NYC83FA032 · Cessna 172H
Cessna 172H · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From Elmira Corning Regional Airport (ELM) to Youngstown Warren Regional Airport (YNG)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's location. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC83FA032
- 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
Cessna 172H
- 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
- N9511H
- Operator
- William B. Plotts · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Elmira Corning Regional Airport (ELM), Elmira, NYTo Youngstown Warren Regional Airport (YNG), Youngstown, OH
- 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
- 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
- Horizontal stabilizer surface › Ice
- Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, continued
- Pilot in command › Proper descent rate, not possible
- Propeller system/accessories, blade › Ice
- Wing › Ice
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
WHILE ENROUTE THE PLT REPORTED HE WAS ICING UP & WOULD HAVE TO DIVERT TO BRADFORD. ABOUT 12 MI FROM THE ARPT THE PLT DECLARED AN EMERGENCY STATING HE DIDN'T THINK HE COULD MAKE A MISSED APPROACH WITH THE ICE BUILDUP. THE PLT THEN REPORTED A ROUGH ENGINE & AN AIRSPEED OF ABOUT 70K WITH FULL THROTTLE. JUST PRIOR TO THE CRASH THE PLT REPORTED THAT HE HAD SO MUCH ICE ON HIS WINDSHIELD THAT HE COULDN'T SEE. THE ACFT CRASHED ABOUT 1 MI SHORT OF RWY 32. COATING THE LEADING EDGE OF THE LEFT HORIZONTAL STABILIZER WAS AN ICE BUILDUP WHICH TAPERED IN THICKNESS FROM 1/4 INCH AT THE ROOT TO ABOUT 1-1/2 INCHES AT THE TIP. PIECES OF 3/4 TO ONE INCH THICK ICE WERE FOUND IN THE GROUND SCAR FOUND UNDER THE RIGHT WING. ICING CONDITIONS WERE FORECASTED ALONG THE ROUTE OF FLT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC83FA032
- Event ID
- 20020917X05058
- Case number
- NYC83FA032
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1982-11-27.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 4b30ff5c2e7fdec3bda978c88ac576370e29df9adacb57e5e67c20f944c16870; retrieved 2026-09-21T18:03:32.349Z.