CESSNA R182 — Dougherty, TX, 2009

CESSNA R182 — Dougherty, TX

2 fatal NightIMC

Date	June 19, 2009
Location	Dougherty, TX
Aircraft	CESSNA R182
Purpose of flight	Personal
Conditions	Night · Instrument Meteorological Cond
Phase / occurrence	Enroute-cruise Windshear or thunderstorm
Pilot age	53
Pilot total time	412 hrs · Building experience
Time in type	45 hrs
Fatalities	2

Probable cause

The pilot’s improper decision to continue flight into known adverse weather conditions resulting in his inability to maintain aircraft control after penetrating the thunderstorm gust front. Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s lack of preflight planning, failure to obtain a weather briefing, and the severe to extreme turbulence, blowing dust which produced brownout conditions associated with thunderstorm activity.

NTSB findings

Personnel issues-Task performance-Use of equip/info-Aircraft control-Pilot - C
Personnel issues-Task performance-Planning/preparation-Weather planning-Pilot - F
Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Convective weather-Thunderstorm-Effect on operation - F
Personnel issues-Action/decision-Info processing/decision-Decision making/judgment-Pilot - C
Aircraft-Aircraft oper/perf/capability-Performance/control parameters-(general)-Capability exceeded
Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Turbulence-Convective turbulence-Effect on operation
Environmental issues-Conditions/weather/phenomena-Convective weather-Thunderstorm-Decision related to condition

What happened

Radar data provided for the last portion of the accident flight depicted the airplane changing heading and altitude on several occasions. The airplane impacted an open field in a nose low attitude and was fragmented on impact. An examination of the airframe, engine, and airplane systems revealed no pre-impact anomalies. Weather information for the time of the accident depicted an area of light precipitation, consistent with the outflow boundary from a thunderstorm in the immediate vicinity of the accident location, at the time of the accident. Convective SIGMETS, METAR observations, and witness reports illustrated thunderstorm activity, brownout conditions, a dust storm, and the possibility of severe to extreme turbulence at the time of the accident. There was no record that the pilot had obtained a formal weather briefing from a recorded source. The pilot’s flight logbook was located within the wreckage. A review of the logbook indicated that the pilot had logged no less than 412 hours; 45.5 hours in the make and model of the accident airplane, 17.7 hours at night, and 4.6 hours in simulated instrument meteorological conditions.

An editorial "what led to it / how to avoid it" analysis for this accident is generated separately and will appear here.