Valley Aviation Piper PA 32-260 accident
Piper PA 32-260 · Accident: loss of control in flight during landing
From Healy River Airport (PAHV) to Anderson, AK
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC14CA060
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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 32-260
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-32
- 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
- N3502W
- Operator
- Valley Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Healy River Airport (PAHV), Healy River, AKTo Anderson, AK
- Aircraft age
- About 48 years (built 1966)
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- Landing
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- 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 › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was landing the tricycle gear equipped airplane at a remote, unimproved airport, which was surrounded by mountainous terrain. Before beginning his approach, the pilot assessed the wind conditions, and then planned an approach into a 25 to 35 knot quartering headwind. On short final, approximately 20 feet above ground level, a sudden wind shift caused the airplane to descend faster than anticipated. He attempted to arrest the descent by adding engine power, but the airplane landed hard and the right main wheel axle separated from the airplane. The airplane sustained substantial damage to the right wing, aileron and stabilator. The pilot stated that there were no preaccident mechanical anomalies with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation.
In the recommendation section of the NTSB Accident/Incident Reporting Form 6120.1, the pilot stated that the accident may have been avoided if a windsock had been present at the airport; he also stated that notes in the Alaska Supplement warning operators of wind shear hazards associated with the terrain surrounding the airport would enhance safety.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate compensation for wind conditions, which resulted in a hard landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC14CA060
- Event ID
- 20140807X40806
- Case number
- ANC14CA060
- 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: 2b5d27af6a73c4d909081e2ee110406f5817881ac1487ec5a5d074d278022973; retrieved 2026-09-16T01:36:44.154Z.