ATL06FA038 · Piper PA-32R-300
Piper PA-32R-300 · Accident: in flight collision with object en route
From Natchez–Adams County Airport / Hardy-Anders Field (HEZ) to Camden Municipal Airport (61A)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL06FA038
- 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-32R-300
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-32
- 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
- N38510
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Natchez–Adams County Airport / Hardy-Anders Field (HEZ), Natchez, MSTo Camden Municipal Airport (61A), Camden, AL
- 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 · descent
- 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 › Altitude/clearance, 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 was on an instrument flight plan from Mississippi to Alabama and received clearance from the Atlanta air Route Traffic Control center (AARTCC) to descend at pilot's discretion. The pilot acknowledged the clearance and initiated his descent. A short time later the pilot informed the controller that he had "broke out of the clouds and was clear." The pilot advised AARTCC to "go ahead and cancel IFR at this time." AARTCC informed the pilot: there was no traffic between him and his destination airport, squawk 1200, cancellation was received, and frequency change was approved. There was no further radio communication between the pilot and AARTCC. the last recorded radar contact with the airplane was 15 statute miles west of the Camden Airport at 3.300 feet. The wreckage was located in a wooded area the following day. Examination of the crash site revealed that the airplane collided with trees consistent with controlled flight and the engine operating. Examination of the airplane revealed no evidence of mechanical failure of malfunction of the airframe, flight controls, or engine assembly and accessories. According to an acquaintance of the pilot, because of his injuries, the pilot was unable to recall any details of the events leading up to the accident.
Probable cause
The pilots failure to maintain altitude and clearance during a visual descent which resulting in an in-flight collision with trees and the ground for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL06FA038
- Event ID
- 20060208X00174
- Case number
- ATL06FA038
- 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: investigation status, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 3b0957bedb319f17428003d710b59522d5fcedfe9a7d031358c64d58edb1119c; retrieved 2026-09-20T17:34:22.346Z.