OPS16IA010 · Mooney M20R
Mooney M20R and Cessna R172K K · Incident: air traffic event en route
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's location. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- OPS16IA010
- 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
- Incident
- 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
- 0
- 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 · Mooney M20R
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N57GX
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ocala International Airport - Jim Taylor Field (OCF), Ocala, FLTo Page Field (FMY), Fort Myers, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 11 years (built 2005)
- 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
- En route · climb to cruise
- 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
- Air traffic event
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- None
Aircraft 2 · Cessna R172K K
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N758PK
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sarasota Bradenton International Airport (SRQ), Sarasota, FLTo Baldwin County Regional Airport (MLJ), Milledgeville, GA
- Aircraft age
- About 37 years (built 1979)
- 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
- En route
- 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
- Near midair/TCAS alert/loss of separation
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- None
Cause areas
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The loss of separation occurred after the air traffic controller issued N57GX a climb from 5,000 feet to 9,000 feet while N758PK was on an opposite direction heading, level at 8,000 feet. The air traffic controller became aware of the incident after the pilot of N57GX reported that he had received a conflict alert and had taken evasive action to avoid a collision with N785PK. After N57GX had departed OCF, the air traffic controller instructed the pilot to climb to 5,000 feet, and subsequently issued the pilot a climb to 9,000 feet, which was the pilot's requested altitude. The air traffic controller did not consider the performance of the aircraft, or the proximity of N785PK when he issued the climb instructions to N57GX. The decision by the air traffic controller to climb N57GX without ensuring minimum radar or vertical separation would exist, and be maintained, resulted in the aircraft coming into close proximity to one another. Additionally, the controller did not issue a safety alert when the air traffic control conflict alert activated, requiring the pilot of N57GX to take evasive action to avoid a collision with N758PK. The closest proximity was estimated to be 0.85 nautical miles lateral and 200 feet vertical separation.
Probable cause
The air traffic controller's decision to issue climb instruction to one aircraft without ensuring the required separation with another could be maintained. Contributing to the incident was the air traffic controller's failure to issue a safety alert in a timely manner.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record OPS16IA010
- Event ID
- 20160418X44917
- Case number
- OPS16IA010
- 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, damage. 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: cefe891f8b983b75c0363eac08bb78a3a482bd1a9c178d10b2dba326e054aec6; retrieved 2026-09-13T18:25:15.134Z.