LAX94LA173 · Cessna 172M
Horizon Aviation Cessna 172M · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Santa Barbara Municipal Airport (SBA) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX94LA173
- 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
Cessna 172M
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N13620
- Operator
- Horizon Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Santa Barbara Municipal Airport (SBA), Santa Barbara, CATo not recorded
- 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
- En route · cruise
- 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
- Loss of engine power
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Tree(s)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, inspection, inadequate
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, installation, improper
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, service of aircraft/equipment, improper
- Pilot in command › Emergency procedure, not followed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE AIRCRAFT LOST ENGINE POWER AND COLLIDED WITH TREES IN MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN. THE PILOT REPORTED THE LOSS OF POWER WAS GRADUAL WITH ENGINE ROUGHNESS. THE PILOT ATTEMPTED TO RESTART THE ENGINE BUT DID NOT MANIPULATE THE MAGNETO SWITCH AS OUTLINED IN THE PILOT OPERATING HANDBOOK AMPLIFIED EMERGENCY PROCEDURES. EXAMINATION OF THE ENGINE MAGNETOS REVEALED THE LEFT MAGNETO INTERNAL TIMING WAS INCORRECT. THE BREAKER POINT CAM AND CAM FOLLOWER WERE FOUND WORN. A SLICK MODEL 4201-R MAGNETO IS NOT AN APPROVED INSTALLATION ON LYCOMING ENGINES. MAINTENANCE RECORDS DID NOT SHOW THAT NEW OR OVERHAULED MAGNETOS WERE INSTALLED AT THE TIME OF THE ENGINE OVERHAUL OR REPLACED AFTER THE ENGINE WAS OVERHAULED. REVIEW OF THE ENGINE LOGBOOK INDICATED THE MAGNETO TIMING WAS ADJUSTED ABOUT 78 FLIGHT HOURS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT AT THE LAST 100-HOUR INSPECTION.
Probable cause
AN ENGINE FAILURE DUE TO THE IMPROPER INSTALLATION AND SERVICE OF AN INCORRECT MODEL MAGNETO BY MAINTENANCE PERSONNEL, AND THE FAILURE OF THE PILOT-IN-COMMAND TO FOLLOW PUBLISHED AIRPLANE EMERGENCY PROCEDURES.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX94LA173
- Event ID
- 20001206X00940
- Case number
- LAX94LA173
- 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: 9168a063db72d9bb69dae8505efef2ed5fc2c5830be79e9036d8d99cd56d2716; retrieved 2026-09-21T22:41:01.461Z.