MIA99LA057 · Piper PA-28-181
Piper PA-28-181 · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From X31 · Crystal River, FL to Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport (OPF)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA99LA057
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Piper PA-28-181
- 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
- N8436C
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From X31 · Crystal River, FLTo Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport (OPF), OPA LOCKA, 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
- 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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
- Tree(s)
- 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
- Pilot in command › Carburetor heat, not used
- Pilot in command › Visual lookout, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
While in cruise flight at between 1,600 and 1,700 feet, the pilot stated the aircraft encountered a very turbulent updraft which passed promptly. A short time later the aircraft began to perform sluggishly, shake, and feel like it had no pitch control. The engine then quit and attempts to restart it were unsuccessful. The aircraft then began to descend uncontrolled and while approaching a field for a forced landing the aircraft crashed into trees. Post crash examination of the aircraft, flight controls, and engine showed no evidence of precrash mechanical failure or malfunction. Icing probability curves showed the aircraft was operating in conditions conducive to serious carburetor icing at cruise power.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to recognize the onset of carburetor icing and take corrective action prior to engine failure and the pilot's failure to maintain visual outlook while making a forced landing resulting in the aircraft colliding with trees.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA99LA057
- Event ID
- 20001211X11608
- Case number
- MIA99LA057
- 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: a232344d0c750fd7cbe69468e22c7da5b36cf1a9720885762b17048e7a6321c0; retrieved 2026-09-21T11:17:09.637Z.