LAX96LA084 · Nicholson SONERAI II
Nicholson SONERAI II · Accident: partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From L39 to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX96LA084
- 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
Nicholson SONERAI II
- Aircraft type
- Nicholson SONERAI
- 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
- N68676
- Operator
- Thomas R. Ortman · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From L39To 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Fluid, fuel › Flow restricted
- Fuel system, vent › Misrouted
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The aircraft had not flown over the past 2 years and was recently purchased by the owner. This was the first flight of the aircraft following a condition inspection to return it to service. The pilot reported that he took off following a detailed inspection of the aircraft and a prolonged ground run-up. At 200 feet over the runway's departure end, the engine sputtered and lost power. The pilot maneuvered the aircraft for a forced landing in an adjoining cattle pasture. The engine suddenly began to run at full power again, and the pilot turned the aircraft toward the runway. The engine began to surge, and the pilot then landed in the pasture. The aircraft encountering rough terrain and was damaged. The pilot said the engine symptoms led him to believe that there might have been a fuel flow problem. The aircraft was examined by FAA airworthiness inspectors who found that the fuel vent line was not routed in accordance with the aircraft plans.
Probable cause
an interruption of fuel flow to the engine due to a misrouted fuel vent line.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX96LA084
- Event ID
- 20001207X05036
- Case number
- LAX96LA084
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1995-12-28.
- API snapshot SHA-256: b8343d154d37f969ee3af4f86ad3b36ad6d0d54ce0ee4ff2db6b0600e136dd09; retrieved 2026-09-21T21:59:14.447Z.