CEN12FA010 · Brinkerhuff Gerald G Q200
Brinkerhuff Gerald G Q200 · Accident: controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT) on approach
From West Michigan Regional Airport (BIV) to Padgham Field (35D)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN12FA010
- 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
Brinkerhuff Gerald G Q200
- Aircraft type
- Brinkerhuff Gerald Q200
- 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
- N2935R
- Operator
- Brinkerhuff Gerald G
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From West Michigan Regional Airport (BIV), Holland, MITo Padgham Field (35D), Allegan, MI
- 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
- Defining eventThe 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
- Controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT)
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was landing the airplane when it contacted a 14-foot 8-inch tall approach light stanchion that was located about 460 feet from the approach end of the runway. The airplane crashed and came to rest inverted. Witnesses reported that the airplane appeared to be operating normally as the pilot performed touch-and-go landings before the accident. Another witness reported the airplane was low as it approached the runway on the final approach. The pilot had about 2 hours of flight time in the newly built tandem wing airplane. A postaccident examination of the airplane and engine did not reveal any preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation. The examination found the throttle in the retarded position and noted that its location required the pilot to reach his left hand across his body to control it while his right hand was on the control stick. According to sun and moon data for the day of the accident, the landing approach would have been in the direction of the setting sun, which likely would have obscured the pilot’s vision as he approached the runway, making it difficult to judge the airplane’s height above the ground and clearance from the approach lights.
Probable cause
The pilot failed to maintain sufficient altitude during the landing approach, which resulted in the airplane contacting an approach light. Contributing to the accident was the setting sun, which most likely obscured the pilot’s vision.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN12FA010
- Event ID
- 20111006X21257
- Case number
- CEN12FA010
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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. 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: 67e2c4a7bcaff232fad51f408953046d85791fb55a65dad19c767d3486ccac6e; retrieved 2026-09-13T21:54:52.143Z.