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CEN22LA166 · Beech B200 None

29 Mar 2022 · Odessa, TX, United States

Integrated Pain Associates, PLLC Beech B200 None · Accident: clear air turbulence encounter on approach

From Draughon Miller Central Texas Regional Airport (TPL) to an unrecorded destination

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Event

NTSB case
CEN22LA166
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
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

Beech B200 None

Aircraft type
Beechcraft 200
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
N469SL
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Draughon Miller Central Texas Regional Airport (TPL), Temple, TXTo not recorded
Aircraft age
About 40 years (built 1982)
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
Clear air turbulence encounter
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

  • Aircraft › Aircraft systems
  • Environmental issues › Conditions/weather/phenomena
  • Personnel issues › Task performance

Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

The pilot reported that while descending at about 160 kts during an instrument approach in visual meteorological conditions with the autopilot engaged, and passing through 5,000 ft msl, the airplane encountered “a sudden pocket” of severe clear air turbulence for one second, resulting in the loss of about 300 ft of altitude. A passenger in the cabin, who was in the process of restraining himself when the turbulence encounter occurred, hit his head on the cabin ceiling and sustained a serious injury. The autopilot was turned off, the pilot continued with the approach, and the airplane landed at the destination airport without further incident.

The airplane did not sustain any damage from the turbulence encounter. The pilot reported there were no preaccident mechanical malfunctions or failures with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation. The pilot reported that at the time of the accident, an AIRMET for moderate turbulence below 12,000 ft msl and high surface winds was active for the area.

The passengers were verbally instructed by the pilot to make sure their restraint systems were fastened. The pilot activated the cabin seatbelt sign as an aural and visual warning as reinforcement.

Probable cause

The airplane’s encounter with severe clear air turbulence that was not forecasted, which resulted in a serious injury to an unrestrained passenger.

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record CEN22LA166
Event ID
20220404104886
Case number
CEN22LA166
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, cause areas, 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: 8fb252034dd7cb2afe2d8f83fb6e2ce49bdff10522af10fd7c104497a625cc50; retrieved 2026-09-16T15:06:10.584Z.