The pilot was maneuvering to land at the airport in Gustavus, Ohio, after a cross-country flight in dark night, visual meteorological conditions.
The pilot said he became disoriented as he orbited the airport waiting for the airport manager to turn on the runway lights, which resulted in him believing that he was on final approach to Runway 1 instead of Runway 19.
The pilot stated that, during final approach, he incorrectly identified a crossing road that he believed was about 3/4 mile south of the Runway 1 approach threshold, however the road he observed was about 1 mile north of the airport.
The pilot stated that he and his passenger suddenly saw tree branches appear as the airplane descended on final approach. He immediately increased engine power and pitch in an attempt to avoid the trees, but the right wing hit a tree, and the Diamond DA-40 hit terrain about 1/2 mile north of Runway 19.
The pilot had previously flown seven hours during nighttime conditions, however he had not flown at night within the 238 days preceding the accident.
According to federal regulations, pilots are prohibited from acting as pilot-in-command with passengers at night unless they have completed three night takeoffs and three night landings within the previous 90 days.
An ancillary benefit of pilots maintaining their regulatory night flight currency is that it demonstrates their having an adequate level of proficiency of night flight operations on a recurring basis. The pilot’s lack of recent night flight experience likely contributed to his becoming disorientated while maneuvering in the airport traffic pattern, the airplane descending below a normal approach path, and the collision with trees.
Probable cause: The pilot’s geographic disorientation while maneuvering in the airport traffic pattern in dark night conditions, which resulted in the airplane descending below a normal approach path and a collision with trees. Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s lack of recent night flight experience.
NTSB Identification: CEN18LA014
This October 2017 accident report is provided by the National Transportation Safety Board. Published as an educational tool, it is intended to help pilots learn from the misfortunes of others.
If he wanted runway 19 and not 1 flying at night was not the problem. The guy failed to fly the correct HEADING!
More instrument training would allow the pilot to use an instrument approach even if vFR would have avoided this mistake , if one was available.
I always fly an instrument approach at nite, it gives you added safety particularly at non towered unfamiliar airports
Very commendable procedure. Unfortunately this airport has no instrument procedures listed now and I assume it didn’t at the time of the accident.
He was navigating by IFR references —- he just wasn’t very good at picking the right Road to navigate by. Those instrument gages in front of him weren’t as good as looking down at the roads (at night)!
On top of that, he was descending into a black hold, toward a point approximately 4000 north of the runway. The landmarks described by the pilot can all be seen on Google maps. Any visual descent from traffic pattern altitude should be toward an aiming point which is inside the runway lights and visually established before the descent starts. From what I see on Google maps, there is nothing in the area of the accident but farmland and trees, so it appears the descent was toward a spot on the ground that had no resemblance to a runway environment (i.e. no lights which may have resembled runway lights).
Even if the airplane had been descending toward a point inside the runway lights there was another scary hazard brought into play by his disorientation – power lines only 50-100 feet north of the runway just on the north side of Gardner Barclay Rd., complete with the warning red balls (seen on street view). Night approaches have these invisible type risks so you should always be on the VASI, not descending to barely inside the green threshold lights. If no VASI, the descent can still be made along the same path by establishing a normal descent angle, and using the runway lights about 750 feet into the runway as the aiming point. I descend toward a point between the third and fourth white runway edge lights at night (close to the 1000ft fixed distance markers) which is normally where a VASI/PAPI is located and equivalent to a red over white indication.