A wrecked aircraft does not have to stay wrecked. If the damage is repairable, the airframe can be rebuilt, returned to service, and — this is the part that catches buyers out — registered under a brand-new tail number. Search the new N-number and the accident does not appear. The airplane looks clean.
The accident did not go anywhere. It is filed under the tail number the aircraft wore on the day it crashed.
The serial number is the thing that does not change
Tail numbers are assigned to owners and can be changed on request. The manufacturer's serial number is stamped on the airframe and stays with it for life. Every FAA registration record carries the serial number, and most NTSB accident records carry it too.
So the check is: get the serial number of the aircraft you are looking at, then search accident records by serial number, not by tail number. If the airframe was involved in an accident under a previous registration, that is where it shows up.
Doing it by hand
1. Get the serial number
Look up the current tail number in the FAA Aircraft Registry. The record lists the manufacturer, model, year, and serial number. Write down the serial number exactly as printed.
2. Search the NTSB by serial number
Go to the NTSB CAROL database and search on the serial number rather than the registration. Note that CAROL's coverage of older events is uneven — accidents from the 1960s through the early 2000s are documented, but the fields available for searching are thinner the further back you go.
3. Check the deregistration file
An airframe that changed identity usually leaves a trail: the old N-number appears in the FAA's deregistered aircraft file, carrying the same serial number. A serial number that shows up under two different registrations is worth understanding before you make an offer.
4. Ask for the Form 337s
A major repair or major alteration requires FAA Form 337. Substantial post-accident repair generates one. The aircraft's document file is held by the FAA Civil Aviation Registry, and the images are available free to the buyer through the FAA's own records portal — you do not need to buy them from anyone.
What a rebuild does and does not mean
A repaired aircraft is not automatically a bad aircraft. Plenty of airframes have been through a gear-up landing, been repaired correctly, signed off, and flown safely for decades since. Damage history is not a disqualifier — it is a price and inspection issue.
What matters is that you know before you negotiate, not after. A documented repair history changes what the airplane is worth, changes what your pre-buy inspector should be looking at, and occasionally changes what your insurer will write.
The failure mode to avoid is simple: searching one tail number, seeing nothing, and assuming there is nothing to see.