WPR16LA016 · Cessna 310C C
Cessna 310C C and Piper PA 28R-200 · Accident: midair collision while maneuvering
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR16LA016
- 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 · Cessna 310C C
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 310
- 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
- N310CD
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Henderson Executive Airport (HND), Henderson, NVTo Henderson Executive Airport (HND), Henderson, NV
- Aircraft age
- About 56 years (built 1959)
- 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
- Maneuvering
- 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 · Piper PA 28R-200
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N9475N
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Henderson Executive Airport (HND), Henderson, NVTo Henderson Executive Airport (HND), Henderson, NV
- Aircraft age
- About 46 years (built 1969)
- 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
- Maneuvering
- 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 as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Both the multi-engine airplane and the single-engine airplane were maneuvering in the local practice area at 6,500 ft mean sea level. The flight instructor and private pilot receiving instruction on board the multi-engine airplane were performing an introductory/familiarization flight. The flight instructor reported that the airplane was on a northwesterly heading when he observed a small dot in front of him; he then saw an approaching airplane just before impact. He stated that the pilot receiving instruction, who was controlling the airplane at the time, made a slight nose-down input just before the collision. After assessing the damage as a jammed rudder, the flight instructor elected to proceed back to the departure airport, where he landed the airplane uneventfully.
The private pilot of the single-engine airplane stated that, while performing engine power checks on a southwesterly heading and while in a left turn, he heard a loud bang. He subsequently observed another airplane flying away from his position and then heard a radio transmission on the departure airport's tower frequency, advising that the pilot had been involved in a midair collision. The airplane then experienced a total loss of engine power, and the pilot subsequently performed an uneventful forced landing on a dry lake bed. Examination of the airplane revealed substantial damage to the right forward wing root area, which compromised the fuel system and resulted in the subsequent loss of engine power.
The practice area where the accident occurred was used widely for training flights, and pilots operating in the area typically monitored the common traffic advisory frequency (CTAF) of a nearby, non-tower-controlled airport. The pilots of both accident airplanes, however, were only monitoring the tower frequency of their departure airport. Had the pilots of both airplanes been more vigilant in scanning for potential traffic in the area while maneuvering, as well as monitoring and communicating their positions on the CTAF frequency, the midair collision would most likely have not occurred.
Probable cause
The inadequate visual lookout by the pilots of both airplanes, which resulted in a midair collision. Contributing to the accident was the pilots' failure to tune to, monitor, and communicate over the common traffic advisory frequency their relative positions while in the training area.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR16LA016
- Event ID
- 20151023X90108
- Case number
- WPR16LA016
- 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: b88ad7b3db677b4a3d7cea53bb43c668a391ea0a94637720457500ddbfddbcc3; retrieved 2026-09-13T18:24:33.941Z.