LAX94FA308 · Piper PA-28R-200
Piper PA-28R-200 · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Salt Lake City International Airport (SLC)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX94FA308
- 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
- 4 · 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-28R-200
- 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
- N6959J
- Operator
- Larry Wright
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Salt Lake City International Airport (SLC), Salt Lake City, UT
- 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 (mechanical failure)
- 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
- Wire, transmission
- 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
- Engine assembly, connecting rod bolt › Fractured
- Engine assembly, connecting rod cap › Fractured
- Engine assembly, connecting rod › Fractured
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
A FEW MINUTES AFTER TAKEOFF, WITNESSES REPORTED SEEING THE AIRCRAFT IN THE NIGHT SKY FLYING BETWEEN 50 AND 100 FEET AGL, WESTBOUND, APPROXIMATELY 3 1/2 MILES FROM THE AIRPORT. THE AIRCRAFT WAS NEXT OBSERVED IN A LEFT DESCENDING TURN OVER THE FREEWAY WITH THE ENGINE MAKING LOUD AND UNUSUAL NOISES. THE AIRCRAFT SUBSEQUENTLY STRUCK A SECTION OF OVERHEAD HIGH-TENSION ELECTRICAL LINES THAT SPANNED THE FREEWAY. THE DRIVER OF A NORTHBOUND VEHICLE REPORTED THAT HIS VEHICLE COLLIDED WITH THE AIRCRAFT AS IT SLID ACROSS THE NORTHBOUND LANES OF TRAFFIC. THE AIRCRAFT CAME TO REST IN THE NORTHBOUND EMERGENCY LANE. AT THE TIME OF THE CRASH, THE ONLY OUTSIDE ILLUMINATION WAS FROM GROUND LIGHTS IN THE CITY. UPON INITIAL INSPECTION, IT WAS NOTED THAT THE ENGINE CASE WAS FRACTURED IN THE AREA OF THE NO. 4 CYLINDER. A FURTHER EXAMINATION OF THE INTERNAL COMPONENTS REVEALED THAT THE NO. 4 ROD AND END CAP HAD SEPARATED FROM THE CRANKSHAFT. METALLURGICAL EXAMINATION OF THE FAILED COMPONENTS TO DETERMINE THE FAILURE MODE WAS UNSUCCESSFUL DUE TO DAMAGE SUSTAINED ON THE FRACTURE FACES.
Probable cause
the failure of the No. 4 cylinder connecting rod for undetermined reasons. The dark night lighting conditions, which hampered the ability of the pilots to detect the power lines, was a factor in this accident.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX94FA308
- Event ID
- 20001206X02062
- Case number
- LAX94FA308
- 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: d9947ede00d536e6630069fe7e2d450eb4a6abc9f1aee223ddb966ad6754a742; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:03:17.429Z.