DEN03LA031 · Piper PA-34-200
Piper PA-34-200 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Wendover Airport (ENV) to Skypark Airport (BTF)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN03LA031
- 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
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Piper PA-34-200
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-34
- 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
- N16453
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Wendover Airport (ENV), Wendover, UTTo Skypark Airport (BTF), Bountiful, UT
- 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 · IFR missed 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
- 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
- Wire, transmission
- 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
- Pilot in command › Clearance, not maintained
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot set up for a traffic pattern to runway 16. There was fog observed to the west of the runway, but no fog over the runway. On short final with runway lights in sight and everything going as planned, the pilot said they descended into a patch of fog. The pilot initiated a go around, applying full power, pitching up and making a turn to the east. Seconds later the airplane struck power lines breaking the nose gear rearward and damaging the bottom portions of several airplane bulkheads and stringers aft of the nose gear. The pilot noticed the unsafe gear warning lights and elected to lower the gear. The pilot noted the nose gear light was not lit. The pilot proceeded to another airport and performed an uneventful approach. On landing, the airplane's nose cowling was set down on the runway. The airplane skidded down the runway on its nose cowling until it came to a stop. An examination of the accident area showed broken power poles and downed power lines. An examination of the airplane's systems revealed no anomalies.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to maintain clearance from the power lines and his improper in flight planning and decision to maneuver on a go around without noting where the power lines were. Factors contributing to the accident were the pilot's inability to see the power lines, the dark night, the fog, and the power lines.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN03LA031
- Event ID
- 20030115X00071
- Case number
- DEN03LA031
- 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, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2003-01-09.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 53d3d9e0a6cf8478e42531a603d69488f80ebdf948eee2fb1e345bdc7692e096; retrieved 2026-09-22T09:41:10.230Z.