ERA13LA054 · Vans Aircraft Inc RV-12
Vans Aircraft Inc RV-12 and Boeing E75 · Accident: midair collision on approach
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA13LA054
- 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
- 0 · 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
Aircraft 1 · Vans Aircraft Inc RV-12
- Aircraft type
- Vans RV-12
- 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
- N678AD
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Covington Municipal Airport (CVC), Atlanta, GATo Peach State Aerodrome (GA2), Williamson, GA
- Aircraft age
- About 2 years (built 2010)
- 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
- 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
- Midair collision
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Aircraft 2 · Boeing E75
- Aircraft type
- Boeing E75
- 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
- N1370V
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Seven Lakes Airport (62GA), Jackson, GATo Peach State Aerodrome (GA2), Williamson, GA
- Aircraft age
- About 69 years (built 1943)
- 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
- 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
- Midair collision
- 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
- Personnel issues › Psychological
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
An amateur-built Vans RV-12 (RV-12) intended to land at the non-towered airport, while a Boeing E75 (Stearman), which was the lead airplane in a flight of three Stearmans planned to over-fly the airport at the traffic pattern altitude as part of a fly-in event being held at the airport. The pilot of the RV-12 overflew the airport at an altitude of about 600 feet above the traffic pattern altitude and entered a right downwind for runway 13. Both pilots stated that they communicated their respective positions and intentions over the airport's common traffic advisory frequency. In addition, they were attempting to visually acquire each other when the two airplanes collided. Both pilots were subsequently able to land their respective airplanes without further incident.
Examination of the airplanes revealed that the lower left side of the RV-12's fuselage just aft of the cowling, and the Stearman's rudder sustained substantial damage. The damage was consistent with the RV-12 flying on a northwest heading and Stearman flying on a northerly heading, at the time of the collision. Weather permitting, each pilot was required to maintain vigilance to see and avoid other aircraft. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed at the time of the accident.
Probable cause
The inadequate visual lookout by the pilots of both airplanes, which resulted in a midair collision.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA13LA054
- Event ID
- 20121113X95501
- Case number
- ERA13LA054
- 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, 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: 4de0a0ca6f6c595763b8c6edb7f60d9647bbda8782c2256097d0513b0016546e; retrieved 2026-09-13T18:22:06.846Z.