LAX94LA153 · Piper PA-23-180
Piper PA-23-180 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From L15 · Las Vegas, NV to St George Regional Airport (SGU)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX94LA153
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Piper PA-23-180
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-23
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N2142P
- Operator
- Proflight
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From L15 · Las Vegas, NVTo St George Regional Airport (SGU)
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Initial climb
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Total loss of engine power (non-mechanical)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Airspeed(vmc), not maintained
- Pilot in command(cfi) › In-flight planning/decision, inadequate
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Propeller feathering, inadvertent
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Supervision, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DURING THE ACCIDENT FLIGHT, THE CFI WAS IN THE FINAL PROCESS OF PREPARING THE SECOND PILOT TO TAKE HIS MULTIENGINE CFI CHECK RIDE. AFTER COMPLETING A TOUCH-AND-GO LANDING, THE AIRPLANE CLIMBED TO BETWEEN 200- AND 300-FEET AGL. THE CFI ATTEMPTED TO RETARD THE LEFT ENGINE'S THROTTLE, BUT ACCIDENTALLY RETARDED THE LEFT ENGINE'S PROPELLER CONTROL INTO THE FEATHER DETENT. THE CFI MANEUVERED THE AIRPLANE WHILE ATTEMPTING TO RESTART THE LEFT ENGINE. DURING THIS TIME, THE AIRCRAFT BY-PASSED SEVERAL SUITABLE LANDING SITES AND ENDED UP OVERFLYING HILLY TERRAIN AS THE AIRCRAFT CONTINUED A GRADUAL DESCENT. THE PILOT LOST CONTROL OF THE AIRPLANE AS THE AIRSPEED DECREASED; THE AIRCRAFT ROLLED TO THE LEFT AND COLLIDED WITH HILLY TERRAIN. THE LEFT ENGINE AND PROPELLER COMBINATION WAS REMOVED FROM THE AIRCRAFT AND INSTALLED IN AN ENGINE TEST CELL. THE ENGINE, PROPELLER, AND PROPELLER GOVERNOR WERE FOUND TO FUNCTION NORMALLY THROUGHOUT THEIR NORMAL OPERATING RANGES.
Probable cause
THE FLIGHT INSTRUCTOR'S INADVERTENT MOVEMENT OF THE LEFT ENGINE PROPELLER CONTROL INTO THE FEATHER POSITION, HIS DECISION TO BY-PASS SUITABLE LANDING SITES IN AN ATTEMPT TO RESTART THE LEFT ENGINE AS THE AIRCRAFT ENERGY AND PERFORMANCE CAPABILITY DETERIORATED, HIS FAILURE TO MAINTAIN AN AIRPSEED AT OR ABOVE VMC, HIS FAILURE TO MAINTAIN CONTROL OF THE AIRCRAFT, AND HIS INADEQUATE SUPERVISION OF THE FLIGHT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX94LA153
- Event ID
- 20001206X00926
- Case number
- LAX94LA153
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: bc762f31c92284c3c6895f41fd45b71cdd94a2338a424bbb51d1e7f47c474ff6; retrieved 2026-09-21T14:03:50.065Z.