FTW95LA072 · Piper PA-12
Piper PA-12 · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From La Porte Municipal Airport (T41) to Baytown Airport (HPY)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW95LA072
- 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-12
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-12
- 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
- N2820M
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From La Porte Municipal Airport (T41), TXTo Baytown Airport (HPY), Baytown, TX
- 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
- 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
- Fuel starvation
- 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
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Fuel system, strainer › Failure, total
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ENGINE LOST POWER WITHOUT WARNING WHILE IN CRUISE FLIGHT AT 1,000 FEET. THE PILOT LANDED ON A NARROW DIRT ROAD ON A LEVEE. DURING THE LANDING ROLL, THE MAIN LANDING GEARS SUNK INTO SOFT MUD AND RUTS, AND THE AIRPLANE NOSED OVER COMING TO REST ON ITS BACK. THE PILOT, WHO IS ALSO THE CERTIFICATED MECHANIC THAT HAD RECENTLY REBUILT THE AIRPLANE, STATED THAT PRIOR TO THE FLIGHT, HE FOUND FUEL LEAKING FROM AROUND THE GLASS BOWL IN THE GASCOLATOR ASSEMBLY. THE PILOT ADDED THAT HE RESEATED THE GLASS BOWL AND SECURED THE LOCKING SCREW WITH SAFETY WIRE. EXAMINATION OF THE WRECKAGE REVEALED THAT THE GASCOLATOR GLASS BOWL WAS MISSING, RESULTING IN THE FUEL STARVATION OF THE ENGINE.
Probable cause
LOSS OF ENGINE POWER DUE TO FUEL STARVATION AS RESULT OF THE FAILURE OF THE GLASS BOWL ON THE GASCOLATOR. A FACTOR WAS THE LACK OF SUITABLE TERRAIN AT THE PILOT'S DISPOSAL TO EXECUTE A FORCED LANDING.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW95LA072
- Event ID
- 20001206X02727
- Case number
- FTW95LA072
- 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: 826be68a346c8018375431ed0f651f66e5ba3e74f019464bb5e863f9164fa659; retrieved 2026-09-21T22:25:00.627Z.