Planemasters Flight 1627
Cessna 208B · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From Decatur Airport (DEC) to Chicago Rockford International Airport (RFD)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI03FA041
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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 208B
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 208
- 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
- N277PM
- Operator
- Planemasters
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Decatur Airport (DEC), Decatur, ILTo Chicago Rockford International Airport (RFD), Rockford, IL
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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 · IFR final 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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 › Aircraft control, 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 collided with trees and terrain following a loss of control during an Instrument Landing System (ILS) approach at night. The impact occurred approximately 2.1 miles from the approach end of the runway. A witness reported hearing the airplane at "mid-throttle" as it flew over. He then heard the power increase followed by the impact. The witness stated there was no precipitation at the time of the accident and there were "severe winds, mostly from the south, shifting volatile directly from the east." He also stated the visibility was "extremely poor." Statements were received from five pilots who landed in transport category airplanes around the time of the accident. Three of these pilots reported experiencing a crosswind that varied from 15 to 50 knots during the approach. Four of the pilots reported airspeed fluctuations that varied between +/- 8 knots to +/- 10 knots during the approach. Three of the pilots reported breaking out of the clouds between 200 and 300 feet agl. Radar data indicates the airplane was high on the glideslope until it entered a rapid descent from an altitude of about 2,300 feet. Examination of the airframe, engine, and propeller governors failed to reveal any failures/malfunctions that would have resulted in the loss of control.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain control of the airplane during the ILS approach. Factors associated with the accident were the low ceilings, high winds, crosswind, and wind shear conditions that existed.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI03FA041
- Event ID
- 20021223X05628
- Case number
- CHI03FA041
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (5)
- 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, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2002-12-18.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 1e0b272fb160a70ea3169eba52c7bfd1d890a7141c46cfddd7294248462704e9; retrieved 2026-09-18T13:03:24.184Z.
- The NTSB's operator name is blank for N277PM; the operator shown is the name the NTSB records it doing business as.