Accident Douglas DC-3-178 N16030,

ASN Wikibase Occurrence # 336152

Date:	Friday 9 June 1950
Time:	19:00
Type:	Douglas DC-3-178
Owner/operator:	New Tribes Mission
Registration:	N16030
MSN:	1546
Year of manufacture:	1936
Total airframe hrs:	36534 hours
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 15 / Occupants: 15
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed, written off
Category:	Accident
Location:	31 km ENE of Fonseca - Colombia
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Passenger - Non-Scheduled/charter/Air Taxi
Departure airport:	Kingston Airport (KIN/MKJP)
Destination airport:	Maracaibo-Grano de Oro Airport (ORO/SVMO)
Investigating agency:	CAB
Confidence Rating:	Accident investigation report completed and information captured

Narrative:
The DC-3, operated by New Tribes Mission, departed Miami at 10:45 for Kingston, Jamaica and Maracaibo, Venezuela. It arrived at Kingston at 15:12 and departed at 15:45 on an IFR plan of four hours to cruise at 9,500 feet direct to Maracaibo. At 18:52 the flight advised Balboa that it was "over the coast line at 5,000 feet and descending VFR." This was the last message received from the aircraft which never arrived at Maracaibo. An intensive search from the air was made without success until about June 28, when it was discontinued. However the New Tribes Mission continued the air search using a Stinson aircraft out of Maracaibo. Their search from this point was unsuccessful and on July 5 their base of operations was moved from Maracaibo to Fonseca, Colombia. At this point it was learned from natives of an outlying Indian village that a plane had been seen on the evening of June 9 headed in a southerly direction. On July 6 the Mission search plane sighted wreckage near the top of a mountain at an elevation of 4,400 feet approximately 42 miles west of the direct Kingston-Maracaibo course. The rescue party found out that the plane had hit a tree about 15 feet above the ground on the very top of a mountain in the Serrania de Valledupar Range, shearing off the left wing at the joint next to the engine. Ten feet further the right wing as sheared off at the joint next to the engine. The plane then crashed inverted and caught fire.

PROBABLE CAUSE: "The Board finds that there is not sufficient evidence upon which to make a determination of probable cause."

Accident investigation: