LAX94LA189 · Piper PA-28-140
Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure) during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Big Bear City Airport (L35)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX94LA189
- 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-28-140
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N4129J
- Operator
- George Abernathy
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Big Bear City Airport (L35), Big Bear City, CA
- 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
- Partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure)
- 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
- Fuel system, gascolator › Leak
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, installation, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT DEPARTED AT NIGHT FROM AN UNCONTROLLED AIRPORT AFTER AN EN ROUTE STOP. DURING THE INITIAL CLIMB, ABOUT 200' ABOVE THE GROUND, THE ENGINE BEGAN TO LOSE POWER. THE PILOT WAS UNABLE TO RESTORE POWER & SELECTED A FORCED LANDING AREA. DURING THE LANDING, THE AIRPLANE STRUCK A BUSH, SEPARATING THE AIRPLANE'S LEFT WING. THE PILOT RECOVERED THE AIRPLANE & CONDUCTED SEVERAL POST-CRASH INSPECTIONS. AN EXAMINATION OF THE ENGINE BY AN FAA INSPECTOR REVEALED A LEAK AT THE GASCOLATOR GASKET. FURTHER EXAMINATION REVEALED THE GASCOLATOR WAS NOT SAFETY WIRED & THE FUEL SCREEN WAS MISSING. ALSO, THE LIP OF THE GASCOLATOR BOWL HAD 2 GOUGES, THE GASKET WAS TOO SMALL FOR THE INSTALLATION, & THE GASKET APPEARED TO HAVE ALLOWED AIR INTO THE FUEL SYSTEM. THE FAA INSPECTOR COULD NOT DETERMINE TO WHAT EXTENT THE PILOT'S POST-CRASH INSPECTION HAD ON THE AIRWORTHINESS OF THE AIRPLANE. THE AIRPLANE RECEIVED AN ANNUAL INSPECTION ABOUT 25 FLIGHT HOURS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT.
Probable cause
LOSS OF ENGINE POWER DUE TO AN AIR LEAK AT THE GASCOLATOR GASKET, WHICH WAS IMPROPERLY INSTALLED DURING MAINTENANCE. DARKNESS WAS A RELATED FACTOR.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX94LA189
- Event ID
- 20001206X01133
- Case number
- LAX94LA189
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1994-04-16.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 3558ca5301caf58409b9be1579f038769b20d4b01e2c756a5bf65f151b82d196; retrieved 2026-09-23T01:10:36.457Z.