NYC07FA038 · Smith, Ted Aerostar 601P
Smith, Ted Aerostar 601P · Accident: loss of control in flight on approach
From Westchester County Airport (HPN) to Deerfield Valley Regional Airport (4V8)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC07FA038
- 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
Smith, Ted Aerostar 601P
- Aircraft type
- Smith Ted Aerostar 601
- 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
- N9797Q
- Operator
- Robert B. North Jr · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Westchester County Airport (HPN), White Plains, NYTo Deerfield Valley Regional Airport (4V8), West Dover, VT
- 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
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
On the day of the accident, the pilot was returning to his home airport, after dropping off friends at a different airport. No weather briefing or flight plan was filed with Flight Service for either flight. A witness and radar data depicted the accident airplane on a straight-in approach for runway 1, in a landing configuration, at a groundspeed of approximately 120 knots. The last radar target was recorded about 1/4 mile from the runway threshold, at an altitude of approximately 150 feet agl. The wreckage was later found about 1/2 mile east of the runway threshold. Review of weather information revealed general VFR conditions along the route of flight, and at reporting stations near the accident site. Gusty winds, low-level wind shear, and moderate to severe turbulence also prevailed at the time of the accident. In addition, weather radar depicted scattered light snow showers in the vicinity of the accident site, and possibly a snow squall. Examination of the wreckage did not reveal any preimpact mechanical malfunctions. The pilot had a total flight experience of 14,000 hours, with 8,500 hours in multiengine airplanes, including 2,600 hours in the same make and model as the accident airplane. He also had 4,100 hours of instrument flight experience.
Probable cause
A loss of control during approach for undetermined reasons, which resulted in a collision with trees.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC07FA038
- Event ID
- 20061216X01798
- Case number
- NYC07FA038
- 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: c6c45726d0fe83507e3a83e10f4cbbb71579fd0efc7e91c6a6aebef2ef371d42; retrieved 2026-09-20T16:58:32.662Z.