FTW94LA205 · Grumman G-164B
Grumman G-164B · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) during initial climb
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW94LA205
- 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
Grumman G-164B
- Aircraft type
- Grumman G-164
- 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
- N112JM
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo 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 137: Agricultural
- 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 (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
- Eng assembly, blower/impeller/integral supercharger › Failure, total
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DURING THE TAKEOFF INITIAL CLIMB SMOKE CAME FROM THE ENGINE AND A POWER HESITATION OCCURED. THE PILOT DUMPED THE LOAD AND TURNED THE AIRPLANE TOWARD THE AIRPORT. AS MORE SMOKE CAME FROM THE ENGINE, A TOTAL LOSS OF POWER OCCURRED. DURING THE FORCED LANDING THE AIRPLANE CROSSED A TREE LINE AND LANDED IN A RICE FIELD. DURING THE LANDING ROLL, THE MAIN GEAR HIT A LEVEE AND THE AIRPLANE CAME TO REST INVERTED. EXAMINATION OF THE ENGINE AND ACCERSSORIES REVEALED THE SUPERCHARGER IMPELLER P/N 12788 WAS DAMAGED WHERE THE BLADES HAD CONTACTED THE HOUSING. THE IMPELLER BEARING P/N 288943 HAD FAILED AND ALLOWED THE IMPELLER TO BE DESTROYED RESULTING IN A COMPLETE LOSS OF THE ENGINE POWER.
Probable cause
A SUPERCHARGER IMPELLER BEARING FAILURE. A FACTOR WAS THE LACK OF SUITABLE TERRAIN FOR THE FORCED LANDING.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW94LA205
- Event ID
- 20001206X01536
- Case number
- FTW94LA205
- 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: 05f9e540ca8ab6b9183bcace1eb6608a78a27558310e72d289fc14127608109c; retrieved 2026-09-23T01:00:04.651Z.