MIA05CA161 · Vans Aircraft RV-3
Vans Aircraft RV-3 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From Clearwater Air Park (CLW) to Shady Bend Airport (9FL5)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA05CA161
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Vans Aircraft RV-3
- Aircraft type
- Vans RV-3
- 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
- N993FL
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Clearwater Air Park (CLW), Clearwater, FLTo Shady Bend Airport (9FL5), Bell, FL
- 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
- 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 › Visual lookout, 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 pilot stated that the runway was less visible than anticipated, partly due to the scattered clouds. He made several passes to identify the runway. It looked to him he had it made but veered off, possible looking at the altimeter, and hit the top of a tree. The airplane separated in several sections from the impact. The section he was in hung from the tree a few feet above the ground in an up-side down position. He released the seat belt restraints and ran for help to put out the fire as a result of the crash.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain visual lookout during a VFR approach toward the runway resulting in-flight collision with trees. Factors in this accident are no lights for the grass strip runway and attempting to land in low natural light visibility conduction.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA05CA161
- Event ID
- 20051013X01630
- Case number
- MIA05CA161
- 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 2005-09-26.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 43c3311fcfa973539dcf467759f1d7197589ac80a016eb738224408e96bb2461; retrieved 2026-09-21T18:53:27.259Z.