LAX95FA088 · Piper PA-28-180
Piper PA-28-180 · Accident: partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From L35 to Avi Suquilla Airport (P20)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX95FA088
- 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
- 2 · 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-28-180
- 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
- N9602J
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From L35To Avi Suquilla Airport (P20), Parker, AZ
- 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 (non-mechanical)
- 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
- Induction air control/system › Blocked(partial)
- Pilot in command › Aircraft preflight, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
WITNESSES REPORTED OBSERVING NOTHING UNUSUAL DURING THE AIRPLANE'S TAKEOFF, EXCEPT THAT THE AIRPLANE ONLY CLIMBED TO ABOUT 300 FEET ABOVE GROUND LEVEL AS IT PASSED THE DEPARTURE END OF RUNWAY 08. THE AIRPORT'S PUBLISHED DEPARTURE PROCEDURE IS TO TURN 10 DEGREES LEFT OF THE RUNWAY HEADING AND OVERFLY LEVEL TERRAIN. SECONDS AFTER TAKEOFF, THE AIRPLANE WAS OBSERVED BEGINNING A RIGHT CROSSWIND TURN OVER RISING TERRAIN, AND IT COLLIDED WITH TREES AND A SNOW-COVERED MOUNTAINSIDE ABOUT 0.76 MILES SOUTHEAST OF THE AIRPORT. EXAMINATION OF THE AIRPLANE REVEALED THE ENGINE COMPARTMENT AIR INDUCTION SYSTEM WAS PARTIALLY BLOCKED BY THE PRESENCE OF 2-INCH-THICK FOAM RUBBER COWL PLUGS. THE PLUGS HAD BEEN LOCATED IN FRONT OF THE NO. 1 AND 2 CYLINDERS, AND INSIDE THE CARBURETOR AIR SCOOP INLET. THE PLUGS EXHIBITED A HANDMADE APPEARANCE.
Probable cause
the pilot's improper preflight inspection during which he failed to insure removal of the induction air system inlet covers. This action resulted in a partial loss of engine power during initial climb. A factor which contributed to the accident was the pilot's decision to not follow published takeoff procedures which would have permitted flight over lower elevation terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX95FA088
- Event ID
- 20001207X02878
- Case number
- LAX95FA088
- 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: 798a3ab7821648bf64173957593cfd0f34344b7122f8f4f7390ba2209b22ca20; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:52:47.189Z.