C172 pilot reports a near midair collision west of ord class B at 3;000 ft with another aircraft clo...

Narrative:

I was cruising on a heading of 180; 3;000 MSL 7 NM north of the town of sandwich; il. Using visual traffic avoidance techniques I noticed a plane off my left side approximately at my 7 - 8 O'clock position at the same altitude appearing to be flying in formation with me. Upon continued observation I noticed the plane heading in my direction on what certainly appeared to be a collision course. I'd had my beacon light; nav lights and anti collision strobes on at the time but the pilot of the plane either didn't see me or didn't think he was going to hit me. Once I realized that a collision was imminent with the aircraft less than 200 yards away and approaching fast I pulled the engine throttle to idle pushed hard forward on the yoke to initiate an immediate dive and banked to the right to help exacerbate altitude loss. I dove down about 400 ft before recovering from that attitude. After stabilizing the airplane on a heading of 210 degrees I looked out; up and right of my windshield and noticed the other aircraft at its same altitude flying along its original course. I was unable to identify the airplane at the time. I immediately made a left turn to 090 degrees to return to my home airport. The entire incident from notice of traffic to performing evasive maneuvers was less than 15 seconds.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: C172 pilot reports a NMAC west of ORD Class B at 3;000 FT with another aircraft closing from the 7:30 position. Evasive action is taken by diving and turning but the other aircraft continues on heading and altitude apparently unaware of the situation.

Narrative: I was cruising on a heading of 180; 3;000 MSL 7 NM north of the town of Sandwich; IL. Using visual traffic avoidance techniques I noticed a plane off my left side approximately at my 7 - 8 O'clock position at the same altitude appearing to be flying in formation with me. Upon continued observation I noticed the plane heading in my direction on what certainly appeared to be a collision course. I'd had my beacon light; Nav lights and anti collision strobes on at the time but the pilot of the plane either didn't see me or didn't think he was going to hit me. Once I realized that a collision was imminent with the aircraft less than 200 yards away and approaching fast I pulled the engine throttle to idle pushed hard forward on the yoke to initiate an immediate dive and banked to the right to help exacerbate altitude loss. I dove down about 400 FT before recovering from that attitude. After stabilizing the airplane on a heading of 210 degrees I looked out; up and right of my windshield and noticed the other aircraft at its same altitude flying along its original course. I was unable to identify the airplane at the time. I immediately made a left turn to 090 degrees to return to my home airport. The entire incident from notice of traffic to performing evasive maneuvers was less than 15 seconds.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of July 2013 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	1108437
Time
Date	201308
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	ARR.Airport
State Reference	IL
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Skyhawk 172/Cutlass 172
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Cruise
Route In Use	Other Heading
Flight Plan	VFR
Person 1
Function	Pilot Flying Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Private
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 6 Flight Crew Total 72 Flight Crew Type 72
Events
Anomaly	Conflict NMAC
Miss Distance	Horizontal 400 Vertical 0

C172 pilot reports a near midair collision west of ord class B at 3;000 ft with another aircraft closing from the 7:30 position. Evasive action is taken by diving and turning but the other aircraft continues on heading and altitude apparently unaware of the situation.