ATL96FA037 · Piper PA-28-161
Piper PA-28-161 · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) during initial climb
From Treasure Coast International Airport (FPR) to Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport (FLL)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL96FA037
- 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
- 1 · 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-28-161
- 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
- N114AV
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Treasure Coast International Airport (FPR)To Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport (FLL), FT LAUDERDALE, FL
- 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
- Stall
- 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
- Company maintenance personnel › Maintenance, annual inspection, improper
- Induction air control, air filter/screen › Improper
- Pilot in command › Aborted takeoff, not performed
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, not obtained/maintained
- Pilot in command › Stall, inadvertent
- Ram/induction air › Flow restricted
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the air traffic controller in the airport tower, about 5,000 feet of the runway was used for the takeoff roll. Witnesses reported that after lift-off, the airplane climbed about 200 to 300 feet above the runway and entered a steep right turn. The nose then dropped, and the airplane collided with the ground, adjacent to the runway. Presumably, due to injury, the pilot was unable to recall the occurrence. During a postaccident examination of the airplane, a foam-like material, used for the carburetor air intake filter, was found lodged in the carburetor throat; and one half of the retaining screen (to hold the foam) was absent. According to the aircraft records, the airplane had received an annual inspection three days before the accident flight, during which the filter was replaced. The airplane had been operated for an unspecified time following the inspection. Piper Service Bulletin 891 had been issued to provide for a one piece retainer for the filter, which would have precluded the filter from being drawn into the induction system.
Probable cause
improper re-assembly of the engine induction air filter by maintenance personnel, during an annual inspection, which resulted in a loss of engine power during takeoff; failure of the pilot to abort the takeoff before lift-off; and failure of the pilot to obtain and/or maintain sufficient airspeed, which resulted in a stall.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL96FA037
- Event ID
- 20001208X05090
- Case number
- ATL96FA037
- 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: e83eefdc96838bf41c18acb8c4a8cb7550125c150b27ce5a8202c29556af3b20; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:27:03.427Z.