MIA92LA098 · Mooney M20K
Mooney M20K · Accident: partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Kinston Regional Jetport At Stallings Field (ISO) to Kissimmee Gateway Airport (ISM)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA92LA098
- 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 M20K
- 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
- N231KF
- Operator
- Garofalo, Joseph JR · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Kinston Regional Jetport At Stallings Field (ISO), Kinston, NCTo Kissimmee Gateway Airport (ISM), Kissimmee, 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
- 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
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
PLT STATED THAT WHILE IN CRUISE FLT AT 4,000 FEET THE ENGINE REDUCED TO IDLE POWER OVER A 30 SECOND PERIOD. MOVEMENT OF THE THROTTLE CONTROL HAD NO EFFECT ON ENGINE POWER. WHILE ATTEMPTING A FORCED LANDING AT AN AIRPORT THE AIRPORT COULD NOT BE REACHED AND THE AIRCRAFT WAS DITCHED IN A SWAMP. POST CRASH EXAMINATION OF THE ACFT INDICATED THE THROTTLE CABLE OUTER HOUSING HAD SEPARATED FROM THE THROTTLE CONTROL AT A POINT IT IS SWAGED. THIS ALLOWED THE INNER CONTROL CABLE TO FLEX AND NOT MOVE THE THROTTLE ARM. THE CAUSE OF THE SEPARATION COULD NOT BE DETERMINED. THE ENGINE WAS OPERATED AFTER THE ACCIDENT WITH NO EVIDENCE OF FAILURE OR MALFUNCTION.
Probable cause
THE SEPARATION OF THE SWAGE BETWEEN THE THROTTLE OUTER HOUSING AND THROTTLE CABLE RESULTING IN LOSS OF THROTTLE CONTROL AND THE ENGINE REDUCING TO IDLE POWER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA92LA098
- Event ID
- 20001211X14340
- Case number
- MIA92LA098
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1992-03-16.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 4693792e2e82d21875676be2e1cf91abab34f39324a67c5f964169a73f786284; retrieved 2026-09-23T03:18:34.898Z.