N8110SCessna 150F · 1965

On October 31, 2024, about 1837 central daylight time, a Cessna 150F airplane, N8110S, was destroyed when it was involved in an accident near Wilder, Tennessee. The student pilot was fatally injured. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 personal flight.

Initial Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) track data revealed that the accident airplane departed from runway 26 at Cross Memorial Airport – Whitson Field (CSV), Crossville, Tennessee about 1817. Sunset had occurred at 1744 and the end of civil twilight was at 1811. The airplane proceeded to the northeast, then to the north, and then to the northwest. About one minute before the accident, the airplane turned to the west and ADS-B data ended about 1837, at an altitude about 200 ft above the ground, and about 0.3 miles east of the accident site (see figure 1). The pilot was not in contact with air traffic control prior to the accident and there were no known distress calls received by any facilities in the area.

Figure 1 – The accident airplane’s ADS-B flight track (green arrows) as it flew northwest and the and the annotated location of the accident site.

The initial impact point was a 100-ft-tall hardwood tree, and there was a wreckage path that was oriented on a magnetic heading of 146°. The outboard half of the left wing remained lodged in the top of the tree along the wreckage path. The empennage, aft fuselage, and main landing gear also separated after impact with the tree. The main wreckage, consisting of the right wing, cockpit, engine, and propeller, came to rest inverted at the base of another tree and was consumed by a postimpact fire. All structural components of the airframe were located within the confines of the debris field, which was about 250 ft in length.

An initial review of the weather conditions at the time of the accident revealed that the accident site was located along the eastern edge of an eastward-moving precipitation band (see figure 2). A Convective SIGMET was valid for the area surrounding the accident site. There was no evidence that the pilot received a weather briefing from a source that logged contact with pilots prior to the flight.

Figure 2 – Map showing with weather radar-observed precipitation around 1845, and the area of the accident site circled in red.

The pilot had purchased the airplane about one month prior to the accident. He held a student pilot certificate and reported on an insurance application, submitted on the day of the accident, that he had accumulated 65 total hours of flight experience, including 30 hours in the accident airplane make and model.