LAX93LA150 · Cessna 172
Cessna 172 · Accident: partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Polacca Airport (P10) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX93LA150
- 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
Cessna 172
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N4070F
- Operator
- Juan C. Galban · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Polacca Airport (P10), Chandler, AZTo 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
- 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)
- 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
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, service bulletin/letter, not performed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE AIRPLANE WAS BEING FLOWN ON A LOCAL SIGHTSEEING FLIGHT. THE PILOT SAID HE WAS AT ABOUT 2500 FEET AT CRUISE RPM. AFTER THE AIRPLANE CROSSED THE DAM, THE RPM DROPPED TO IDLE AND THE ENGINE BEGAN TO RUN ROUGH. THE PILOT SELECTED A DIRT ROAD AS A POTENTIAL LANDING SITE. AS HE TURNED FINAL, THE ENGINE REGAINED PARTIAL POWER. THE PILOT ELECTED TO PERFORM A GO AROUND, AT WHICH TIME THE ENGINE AGAIN LOST POWER. THE PILOT ELECTED TO LAND ON A ROADWAY. DURING THE FINAL APPROACH THE LEFT WING STRUCK THE GROUND FIRST, CAUSING THE AIRPLANE TO CARTWHEEL. THE INVESTIGATION REVEALED THE PRIMARY AND MAIN VENTURI WAS A TWO PIECE DESIGN AND THE PRIMARY VENTURI BECAME LOOSE, WHICH CAUSED THE LOSS OF ENGINE POWER. TWO SERVICE BULLETIN'S WERE NOT PERFORMED WHICH WOULD HAVE REPLACED THE TWO PIECE DESIGN WITH A ONE PIECE VENTURI. THE AIRPLANE RECEIVED AN ANNUAL INSPECTION 3 MONTHS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT AND HAD ACCRUED 20 FLIGHT HOURS SINCE THE INSPECTION.
Probable cause
THE FAILURE OF MAINTENANCE PERSONNEL TO PERFORM MANDATORY SERVICE BULLETINS DURING THE ANNUAL INSPECTION 20 FLYING HOURS PRIOR TO THE ACCIDENT WHICH RESULTED IN THE CARBURETOR'S PRIMARY VENTURI BECOMING LOOSE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX93LA150
- Event ID
- 20001211X12008
- Case number
- LAX93LA150
- 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: a7394bd67bb6c38074d40b9cd1a5c9aa9e26040d5d4a9e2413df41907262ab4f; retrieved 2026-09-21T23:01:09.459Z.