SEA04FA143 · Piper PA-28-140
Noland-Decoto Flying Service Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: in flight collision with object while maneuvering
From Cle Elum Municipal Airport (S93) to Cle Elum Municipal Airport (S93)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA04FA143
- 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-28-140
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N1912H
- Operator
- Noland-Decoto Flying Service
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Cle Elum Municipal Airport (S93), Cle Elum, WATo Cle Elum Municipal Airport (S93)
- 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
- Maneuvering
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aircraft weight and balance, not calculated
- Pilot in command › Performance data, not calculated
- Pilot in command › Proper climb rate, not obtained/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 pilot, who had loaded the aircraft to a weight more than 100 pounds over the maximum permissible takeoff gross weight, did not perform either weight and balance or takeoff/climb performance calculations prior to takeoff. He then attempted a takeoff and climb-out in a high density altitude environment, but was unable to maintain a rate of climb sufficient to clear nearby trees without his airspeed dropping to near that at which a stall would occur. After passing through an opening in a line of trees he could not climb over, the pilot elected to attempt to return to the airport. While in a shallow turn, the aircraft came in contact with a tree, which resulted in it loosing enough altitude that it was unable to clear another group of trees between it and the airport. Seeing that he could not clear the trees, the pilot elected to attempt a controlled crash landing in an area between some of the trees, but one of the aircraft's wing impacted one of the trees while the aircraft was still about 15 feet above the ground.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to obtain and maintain a safe rate of climb after takeoff, due to his failure to perform pre-takeoff weight/balance and takeoff/climb performance calculations. Factors include a high density altitude environment, and trees off the departure end of the runway.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA04FA143
- Event ID
- 20040803X01133
- Case number
- SEA04FA143
- 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 2004-07-25.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 6394e3d4e62fe38bfa75e5c6f8fe631e03365ff0202ea10282a4f2fc7ed824d3; retrieved 2026-09-20T18:24:25.897Z.