Skip to content

NYC91FA025

1990-11-07 · BRADFORD, Pennsylvania, United States · Fatal · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed

Airport BFD

N422M has since been reassigned. It is now registered to a different aircraft (CIRRUS DESIGN SR20, built 2003), which was not involved in this event.

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN ADEQUATE TERRAIN CLEARANCE WHILE MANEUVERING TO LAND DURING AN INSTRUMENT APPROACH. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO OBTAIN A WEATHER BRIEFING PRIOR TO DEPARTURE, HIS DELAYED DECISION TO MAKE AN EMERGECY LANDING AFTER ENCOUNTERING ICING CONDITIONS EN ROUTE, ICE ACCUMULATION ON THE AIRPLANE, AND THE DARK NIGHT.

Factual narrative

AT 1948 THE PILOT HAD REQUESTED A LOWER ALTITUDE, AT 1958 REPORTED HAVING DIFFICULTY MAINTAINING ALTITUDE, AND AT 2003 ADVISED HE NEEDED TO LAND AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. WHILE BEING SUBSEQUENTLY VECTORED HE REPORTED HE WAS STILL PICKING UP SOME ICE BUT ABLE TO MAINTAIN AIRSPEED. HE WAS CLEARED FOR AN ILS RWY 32 APPROACH INTP BRADFORD REGIONAL. AT 2037 THE PILOT REPORTED '...I HAVE THE AIRPORT.' RADAR CONTACT WAS LOST AT THE VOR (LOM). THE WRECKAGE PATH WAS ON AN EASTERLY HEADING. TREE DAMAGE INDICATED THE AIRPLANE WAS IN ABOUT A 30 DEG LEFT WING LOW ATTITUDE. THE LANDING GEAR WAS DOWN. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_1990_NYC91FA025.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Search this event elsewhere

External sources are reported, not agency: signal that something happened, not fact about what happened.

Related research

Matched on aircraft type or causal vocabulary (icing). All research papers