LAX95LA180 · Davenport LONG-EZ
Davenport LONG-EZ · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) while maneuvering
From Santa Monica Municipal Airport (SMO) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX95LA180
- 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
Davenport LONG-EZ
- Aircraft type
- Davenport LONG-EZ
- 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
- N41BF
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Santa Monica Municipal Airport (SMO), Santa Monica, CATo 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 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
- Maneuvering
- 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; 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
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Fuel system, electric boost pump › Not installed
- Fuel system, pump › Not installed
- Owner/pilot mechanic › Maintenance, major alteration, improper
- Owner/pilot mechanic › Procedures/directives, not followed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AFTER BEING CLEARED FOR A FLYBY, THE AIRCRAFT WAS OBSERVED OVER THE RUNWAY AT 20 TO 30 FEET AGL. A FEW SECONDS LATER, THE PILOT DECLARED AN ENGINE FAILURE. THE AIRCRAFT MADE A LEFT TURN SOUTHWEST OF THE AIRPORT STRIKING OVERHEAD ELECTRICAL LINES, SEVERING THE RIGHT WING, ROLLING RIGHT, AND CRASHING INTO A RESIDENCE. A POSTACCIDENT INSPECTION OF THE AIRCRAFT REVEALED THAT THE ELECTRIC FUEL BOOST PUMP AND THE MECHANICAL ENGINE- DRIVEN FUEL PUMP HAD BOTH BEEN REMOVED. THE DESIGNER HAD PREVIOUSLY TESTED A GRAVITY FUEL SYSTEM AND FOUND IT UNACCEPTABLE, SINCE THE HEIGHT OF THE FUEL TANKS ABOVE THE CARBURETOR DID NOT PROVIDE A SUFFICIENT FUEL PRESSURE. CONSTRUCTION PLANS STATED THAT THE FUEL SYSTEM IS 'DESIGNED TO REQUIRE TWO FUEL PUMPS', AND THAT THESE TWO FUEL PUMPS ARE A 'MANDATORY REQUIREMENT FOR SAFE OPERATION, AND THAT THERE IS NO ACCEPTABLE WAY AROUND THIS REQUIREMENT.' THE REQUIREMENT WAS REITERATED IN THE JULY, 1980, ISSUE OF THE CANARD PUSHER NEWSLETTER. THIS WAS THE FIRST FLIGHT FOLLOWING THE REMOVAL OF BOTH FUEL PUMPS BY THE PILOT/OWNER.
Probable cause
fuel starvation due to a modification of the fuel system that rendered it incapable of maintaining adequate fuel pressure. The builder/pilot's lack of understanding of the fuel system was a factor in this accident.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX95LA180
- Event ID
- 20001207X03484
- Case number
- LAX95LA180
- 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: ba9ba9a323a9a76f131c2ba21d148eb06c6a8b393926875ac0d0a7c693fff81b; retrieved 2026-09-21T13:18:53.335Z.