Piper PA 24-250 N6767P

Summary

On 3 January 2014 at about 22:15 local time, a Piper PA 24-250 registered N6767P was involved in an accident near Silver City, New Mexico, United States. One person was on board and nobody was injured. The aircraft was substantially damaged. The NTSB has published a probable cause for this accident; it is quoted in full below.

Date

3 January 2014 at 22:15

Classification

Accident

Location

Silver City, New Mexico, United States

Nearest airport

Grant County (SVC)

Coordinates

32.6893, -108.1294

Aircraft

Piper PA 24-250

Registration

N6767P

Category

Airplane

Year built

1960

Engines

1

Operator

Not recorded

Operating rule

Part 91: General Aviation

Purpose of flight

Personal

Phase of flight

Not recorded

Route

Deming → Deming

Aircraft damage

Substantial

Weather

VMC

Light

Day

NTSB number

CEN14LA107

Nobody was injured.

The collapse of the landing gear during landing for reasons that could not be determined during postaccident examinations.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record. This site does not paraphrase or interpret it.

Read the full NTSB narrative

The pilot reported that he lowered the landing gear and observed gear-down indications before touchdown; however, the landing gear collapsed during the landing. A postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that all three landing gear had collapsed; no anomalies in the extension/retraction linkage were found. The airplane owner reported that, during recovery of the airplane, he had adjusted the nose landing gear actuating rod for the nose gear to fully seat on the stop flats. Additionally, the landing gear had been serviced during the most recent annual inspection, which was about 24 flight hours before the accident. Although it is possible that the landing gear was not properly adjusted after the maintenance work, several flights had been conducted in the interim without any reported issues related to the landing gear system. Postaccident examinations revealed that the nose landing gear down lock switch was improperly mounted upside down and that the limit switch was stuck in the closed position. The inoperative nose landing gear switch would have provided a gear down/locked indication to the pilot regardless of the nose landing gear condition. It is possible that the nose landing gear did not fully extend and lock down before landing due to either the inoperative limit switch or a slight misrigging of the system. However, because the landing gear was operated by the transmission jackscrew, it is unlikely that an issue with the nose landing gear would have caused a collapse of the main landing gear if the main landing gear was fully extended and locked in the down position. The reason for the landing gear collapse could not be determined.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record.