CHI06LA187 · Piper PA-18-135
Piper PA-18-135 · Accident: in flight collision with object while maneuvering
From Toledo Executive Airport (TDZ) to Allegheny County Airport (AGC)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI06LA187
- 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-18-135
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-18
- 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
- N9841Q
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Toledo Executive Airport (TDZ), Toledo, OHTo Allegheny County Airport (AGC), Pittsburgh, PA
- 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
- 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
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 was substantially damaged when it impacted power lines and subsequently impacted the ground. The airplane came to rest on a highway that runs through an east-west gap in a line of small mountains. Power lines cross this gap approximately perpendicular to the roadway and were strung between towers on ridges on either side of the road. The towers stood about 80 feet tall and the ridges were about 380 feet above the roadway. The power line that was struck was not the uppermost wire and was about 243 feet above the road. The power lines were not marked with high visibility devices, nor were the towers lighted. Witnesses reported seeing the airplane flying at a low altitude along the roadway and then striking the power lines. The fuel selector valve was positioned for the left fuel tank. Both fuel tanks were found to be empty. The left fuel tank was damaged but not ruptured, and the right fuel tank was ruptured. A fuel odor was present at the accident site and fuel consumption calculations predicted that the fuel used for the flight would not have exceeded the capacity of the selected fuel tank. No preimpact anomalies were found with respect to the airplane, its engine, or systems.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain clearance from the unmarked power line which resulted in the subsequent impact with the roadway. Factors were the unmarked power line, and the low altitude at which the flight was conducted.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI06LA187
- Event ID
- 20060717X00951
- Case number
- CHI06LA187
- 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: b6202eca81b90d090c609f138dacbd059d172306f55ad3fe6608fbb1c39dcd77; retrieved 2026-09-20T17:11:48.303Z.