CEN22LA346 · Meschler Gary R RV-4
Meschler Gary R RV-4 and Hollier B C VANS RV-8 · Accident: ground collision while taxiing
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN22LA346
- 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
- Event fatalities
- Unknown
- 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 · Meschler Gary R RV-4
- Aircraft type
- Meschler Gary RV-4
- 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
- N79KM
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Wittman Regional Airport (OSH), Oshkosh, WITo Pryor Field Regional Airport (DCU), Decatur, AL
- Aircraft age
- About 24 years (built 1998)
- 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
- Taxi · to runway
- 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
- Ground 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 · Hollier B C VANS RV-8
- Aircraft type
- Hollier VANS RV-8
- 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
- N694V
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Wittman Regional Airport (OSH), Oshkosh, WITo Wittman Regional Airport (OSH), Oshkosh, WI
- Aircraft age
- About 19 years (built 2003)
- 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
- Taxi · to runway
- 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
- Ground collision
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Minor
Cause areas
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot of N694V, a tailwheel equipped RV-8, reported that he was taxiing for a visual flight rules (VFR) departure with the intention of conducting a flight in the local area. He was taxiing under the direction of ground marshals in accordance with procedures in effect for the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) AirVenture 2022 fly-in. He was briefly “blinded” by the sun reflecting off the polished wing skin of another airplane and began a shallow S-turn to compensate. As he looked over the left side of his engine cowling, he noticed an airplane emerge from the blind spot. He applied full brakes but was unable to stop before the propeller contacted the empennage of an RV-4, N79KM. The pilot of N79KM, a tailwheel equipped RV-4, reported that he was stopped due to other airplanes in front of him on the taxiway. The RV-4, N79KM, sustained substantial damage to the vertical stabilizer, rudder, and elevator. The RV-8, N694V, sustained minor damage to both propeller blades. The pilots of both airplanes reported no failures or malfunctions with their respective airplanes before the accident.
Probable cause
The failure of the pilot of N694V (RV-8) to maintain clearance from the preceding airplane, N79KM (RV-4), while taxiing for takeoff, which resulted in an on-ground collision.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN22LA346
- Event ID
- 20220730105623
- Case number
- CEN22LA346
- 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, cause areas. 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: 08092614d613f0193675f4d45d2ee27231edf4cbb10a9b1484996e0ded9c0285; retrieved 2026-09-13T18:38:11.231Z.