CEN20LA143 · Air Tractor AT 502 Undesignat
Air Tractor AT 502 Undesignat · Accident: low altitude operation/event while maneuvering
From Pecan Gap, TX to Pecan Gap, TX
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN20LA143
- 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
Air Tractor AT 502 Undesignat
- Aircraft type
- Air Tractor AT-502
- 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
- N9185D
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Pecan Gap, TXTo Pecan Gap, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 28 years (built 1992)
- 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 137: Agricultural
- 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 · low-altitude flying
- 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
- Low altitude operation/event
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Tree(s)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Environmental issues › Physical environment
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was conducting an aerial application flight. There were no witnesses to the accident, but the wreckage path was consistent with an in-flight collision with a tree near the edge of the field and subsequent impact with terrain. Examination of the wreckage revealed no mechanical anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. An autopsy was not performed; however, a review of the pilot’s medical history and postaccident medical treatment did not reveal any evidence that a preexisting medical condition contributed to the accident. The evidence is consistent with the pilot not maintaining adequate clearance from the tree, and the airplane’s collision with a tree and impact with terrain.
Probable cause
The pilot did not maintain adequate clearance from tree, which resulted in a collision with a tree and subsequent impact with terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN20LA143
- Event ID
- 20200408X83712
- Case number
- CEN20LA143
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2020-04-08.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 715d2a29c2f88f5181c4a5c2af125fd63b1cce60c279c4fbd22253278c66c544; retrieved 2026-09-15T07:13:29.640Z.