BFO93FA153 · Mooney M20J
Mooney M20J · Accident: loss of engine power during initial climb
From Freeway Airport (W00) to Freeway Airport (W00)
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO93FA153
- 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
Mooney M20J
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N7666P
- Operator
- Brian Poole
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Freeway Airport (W00)To Freeway Airport (W00)
- 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
- 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
- Fuel starvation; 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
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Fuel system, fuel control › Contamination
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE HAD COMPLETED HIS PRETAKEOFF CHECK AND RUN-UP, SUCCESSFULLY. HE STATED THAT DURING THE INITIAL CLIMB, AT ABOUT 400 FEET ABOVE THE GROUND, THE ENGINE LOST POWER. HE TRIED TO RESTART THE ENGINE, BUT WAS UNABLE. THE AIRPLANE IMPACTED IN A WOODED AREA ABOUT 1/2 MILE NORTH OF THE AIRPORT. THIS WAS THE SECOND FLIGHT WHILE IN MAINTENANCE TO DETERMINE TWO PRIOR PARTIAL POWER LOSSES DURING INITIAL CLIMB. THE AIRPLANE WAS REMOVED TO A HANGAR WHERE AN ENGINE RUN WAS ACCOMPLISHED AFTER A SUBSTITUTE PROPELLER WAS INSTALLED. THE ENGINE ATTAINED OVER 2675 RPM AND 26 INCHES OF MANIFOLD PRESSURE. EXAMINATION OF THE FUEL SERVO INLET SCREENS REVEALED EVIDENCE OF RUST AND CONTAMINATION. FURTHER TESTING OF THE SERVO INDICATED WATER AND CORROSION IN THE DIAPHRAGM ASSEMBLY.
Probable cause
CORROSION IN THE FUEL CONTROL UNIT, WHICH RESULTED IN FUEL STARVATION AND LOSS OF ENGINE POWER. RELATED FACTORS WERE: INADEQUATE MAINTENANCE, AND THE LACK OF SUITABLE TERRAIN FOR AN EMERGENCY LANDING.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO93FA153
- Event ID
- 20001211X13318
- Case number
- BFO93FA153
- 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: f9620bce8ce684f768b2aed7f996415090d9446c4f1942944fde2198905dcb38; retrieved 2026-09-21T14:09:27.774Z.