CHI97LA284 · North American-Aero Classics P-51D
North American-Aero Classics P-51D · Accident: partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Eugene F. Kranz Toledo Express Airport (TOL) to Willow Run Airport (YIP)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI97LA284
- 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
North American-Aero Classics P-51D
- Aircraft type
- North American Aero Classics P-51
- 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
- N6345T
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Eugene F. Kranz Toledo Express Airport (TOL), Toledo, OHTo Willow Run Airport (YIP), Ypsilanti, MI
- 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
- Partial 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
- 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
- Engine assembly, connecting rod › Failure
- Fluid, coolant › Exhaustion
- Miscellaneous, engine › Overtemperature
- Pilot in command › Operation with known deficiencies in equipment, intentional
- Pilot in command › Visual lookout, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
A witness videotaped the airplane taking off from Toledo Express Airport at about 1053 edt. The witness said that he observed gray/white smoke coming from the rear of the airplane. At approximately 1100 edt, a witness traveling eastbound in his vehicle on Michigan State Highway M-50, west of Monroe, Michigan, heard a 'loud vibration/screaming noise and then observed a plane flying eastbound approximately 40 feet along the treetops, just north of M-50. The plane had heavy white and black smoke pouring from the rear. The plane banked right, hit a powerline and plunged to the ground.' Examination of the wreckage revealed that the right front connecting rod was broken near the journal. Metal specks were observed on the cylinders, and molten metal droplets were found in the engine exhaust ports. Examination of the radiator showed small amount of coolant inside. Five empty containers of anti-freeze were found in the left wing locker at the accident site.
Probable cause
the pilot operating the airplane with a known coolant leak, coolant exhaustion, overheating of the engine, and subsequent failure of a connecting rod, which resulted in a partial loss of engine power; and failure of the pilot to see the powerline. The powerline was a related factor.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI97LA284
- Event ID
- 20001208X08807
- Case number
- CHI97LA284
- 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: 07dc7584a2dd2685ebda8c1710bf966216488282e10d488123fff0da5bf8a8b4; retrieved 2026-09-20T22:50:14.370Z.