NYC08FA056 · Beech H35
Beech H35 · Accident: in flight collision with object on approach
From 88J · Allendale, SC to W66 · Warrenton, VA
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC08FA056
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Beech H35
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 35
- 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
- N5481D
- Operator
- Hugh Bryant
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 88J · Allendale, SCTo W66 · Warrenton, VA
- 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
- 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 › Minimum descent altitude, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Procedures/directives, not followed
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 conducting a GPS approach to his home airport, during night, instrument meteorological conditions. The airplane was established on the inbound course, when it crossed the final approach fix at the required crossing altitude (2,200 feet). The airplane then continued a gradual descent until it impacted trees about 4 miles from the airport, on the same heading as the inbound course for the approach. Examination of the airplane and engine revealed no mechanical anomalies. The pilot had accumulated 683 hours of total flight experience, 67 of which were in actual instrument conditions. The pilot completed his most recent instrument proficiency check (IPC) 5 months prior to the accident, during which he performed four instrument approaches in a simulator (none of which included instrument approaches to the destination airport, which was also his home airport). After the IPC, the pilot accumulated 8.4 hours of actual instrument flight time; however, he did not log any instrument approaches. At the time of the accident, weather included overcast clouds at 300 feet, 1 mile visibility, temperature 6 degrees Celsius (C), dew point 6 degrees C. An employee of the fixed base operator at the airport stated that no other aircraft came into the airport on the day of the accident, as it was "very foggy" all day.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to follow the published instrument approach procedure and his failure to maintain the minimum descent altitude which resulted in collision with trees and terrain. Contributing to the accident were the night, instrument meteorological conditions.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC08FA056
- Event ID
- 20080109X00034
- Case number
- NYC08FA056
- 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 2007-12-10.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 245cc1df8a0184b5ee9eb79ea4f5ec88feb095459fdb3552182381566f9fbb31; retrieved 2026-09-20T16:03:46.977Z.