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DA Form 285 handles one job: technical report of u.s. army ground accident. The official title is TECHNICAL REPORT OF U.S. ARMY GROUND ACCIDENT. Download it below, fill it in, sign it, send it where your directive says. The edition on this page is January 2009, status not stated, running 5 page(s) with about 200 fields to complete.
OCSA is the proponent, AR 385-40 the prescribing authority. Read the directive only if something about your situation departs from the standard case. Otherwise the form is filled by the individual it describes, or by the records clerk keeping the file, and reviewed through the printed signature blocks.
PDF, XFDL are available and the decision takes one second. Type your entries: fillable pdf. Write them: printable pdf. The published layout is common to both, so the format governs your method and nothing more.
Save the download and open it in a dedicated reader. That single step prevents the common failure: an in-browser viewer accepts your typing and discards it at tab close. Confirm with one field and one save cycle before committing the whole form. The xfdl copy needs the IBM Lotus Forms Viewer. That format runs in Army systems and nothing else reads it.
Free, unregistered, unmodified. What arrives is what the publisher released.
What the form asks for
- A77A
- A78A
- ACCIDENT
- ACCTYPE_A
- ACCTYPE_B
- ACCTYPE_C
- ACCTYPE_D
- ACCTYPE_E
- ACCTYPE_F
- ACCTYPE_G
- ACCTYPE_H
- ACCTYPE_I
- ACCTYPE_J
- ACCTYPE_K
- ACCTYPE_L
- ACCTYPE_M
- ACCTYPE_N
- ACCTYPE_O
- ACCTYPE_P
- ACCTYPE_Q
- ACCTYPE_R
- ACCTYPE_S
- ACTION_A
- ACTION_AA
Header first, always. Name as your official records spell it, identification number, unit, date of preparation — these four index the finished record, and an error in them hides the document from anyone searching for it later. The substantive blocks can wait thirty seconds.
Tabbing beats clicking for coverage. The order was set at build time and tracks the page layout, so following it leaves no gaps. Boxes and buttons are clicked; where options are exclusive, one selection cancels another by design. Watch field width on long entries: one-line fields have no wrap, and what runs past the edge disappears in print though the screen still shows it. Move that text to remarks or a continuation. Never leave an inapplicable field empty — enter the nil mark, because a reviewer cannot distinguish a skipped question from a considered answer.
Signature comes after every other entry — ink or an approved electronic means, and without it the document is a draft. Where reviewing, approving or witnessing signatures are called for, take them in printed block order, each dated on the day applied. Before release, one pass from the top. The defects worth hunting are always the same four: mandatory fields left empty, identification digits transposed, dates with day and month reversed, and stale data surviving in a copy reused in place of a blank form.
The Privacy Act statement is read before the personal entries, not after. It gives the collection authority, the purpose, the routine uses and whether disclosure is mandatory or voluntary. Once filled, your copy is a personal record and gets stored and transmitted accordingly.
Routing follows AR 385-40 and nothing else — a named office, the unit administrative channel, or the individual's file, according to why the form was raised. Copy it before it leaves. Retention is fixed by the records schedule for the series, which local practice does not shorten or extend.
Companion documents come from the same series and number scheme. Within the DA series, a shared proponent or a shared directive usually means shared use, and a form cited on the face of another accompanies it. Gather the whole package first — continuation sheets, cover sheets, transmittals.
Check the edition date before reusing a saved copy. Revisions come from the proponent without notice to you, and the printed date is the only version marker on the page. Already-submitted records under a superseded edition stand as filed; the change does not run backwards.
The files are copies of published Department of the Army forms. This site has no official connection, no authority to issue anything, and no basis for saying whether an office will accept a given submission. None of the text is legal advice. Real questions — entry, requirement, eligibility — belong with OCSA or the administrative office servicing your unit.
Questions and answers
- What is DA Form 285?
- TECHNICAL REPORT OF U.S. ARMY GROUND ACCIDENT
- Which edition is current?
- January 2009
- Who is responsible for this form?
- OCSA
- In which formats can it be downloaded?
- PDF, XFDL