LAX93LA247 · Tucker THORP T18C
Tucker THORP T18C · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Porterville Municipal Airport (PTV) to 004 · Carson City, NV
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX93LA247
- 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
Tucker THORP T18C
- Aircraft type
- Tucker THORP T18C
- 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
- N794PT
- Operator
- Aldon R. Fisher · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Porterville Municipal Airport (PTV), Porterville, CATo 004 · Carson City, NV
- 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
- 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
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, not maintained
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of South Lake Tahoe, CA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
The airplane experienced a loss of engine power and the pilot initiated an emergency descent for a forced landing. A line service technician at a nearby airport reported hearing a pilot broadcast that he was at 8,500 feet (about 2,200 feet above the airport's elevation). The pilot indicated that he did not believe he could reach the airport. Witnesses observed the descending airplane. One witness saw the airplane between 400 and 500 feet above ground (water) level approaching the shore line and rolling into a left bank turn. The bank angle increased until the airplane was upside down. Thereafter the airplane descended in a near vertical nose low attitude until colliding into the lake, about 45 yards from shore. The crash site was about 5 miles from the airport. During the examination of the engine and propeller, no evidence was found of any pre-impact mechanical malfunctions. Because of impact damage, not all of the accessories could be tested. The odor of fuel and a petroleum slick was observed in the crash site area. The reason for the loss of engine power was not established.
Probable cause
A TOTAL LOSS OF ENGINE POWER FOR UNDETERMINED REASONS, AND THE FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO MAINTAIN CONTROL OF THE AIRCRAFT WHILE MANEUVERING AT A LOW ALTITUDE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX93LA247
- Event ID
- 20001211X12646
- Case number
- LAX93LA247
- 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: 2e92451a90aee1e3baaedda34ee91baff7c18dfea6ff2a4c0e0be59c2d1bb2a4; retrieved 2026-09-21T00:31:26.320Z.