LAX92LA200 · Piper PA23-150
Piper PA23-150 · Accident: partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Q68 · Groveland, CA
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX92LA200
- 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
Piper PA23-150
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA23
- 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
- N2310B
- Operator
- John D. Rowlett · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Q68 · Groveland, CA
- 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
- Partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical)
- 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 contamination
- 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 › Contamination
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
ACCORDING TO THE PILOT, THE AIRCRAFT WAS ABOUT 50 TO 100 FEET AGL IN THE TAKEOFF INITIAL CLIMB WHEN THE LEFT ENGINE SUDDENLY QUIT. THE PILOT CORRECTED FOR THE YAW CONDITION AND HAD JUST RESTABILIZED THE AIRCRAFT WHEN THE LEFT ENGINE SURGED INTO LIFE. THE PILOT DECIDED TO LAND THE AIRCRAFT AND IT IMPACTED GEAR UP IN A LEVEL ATTITUDE IN A GRASSY AREA BETWEEN THE RUNWAYS. FAA AIRWORTHINESS INSPECTORS DETERMINED THAT THE AIRCRAFT WAS OPERATING ON AN AUTOMOTIVE FUEL SUPPLEMENTAL TYPE CERTIFICATE. A QUANTITY OF WATER AND RUST COLORED SEDIMENT WAS DRAINED FROM THE LEFT FUEL TANK SUMP. NO OTHER SYSTEM ABNORMALITIES WERE IDENTIFIED DURING THE EXAMINATION OF THE AIRCRAFT.
Probable cause
AN ENGINE POWER LOSS DUE TO FUEL CONTAMINATION.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX92LA200
- Event ID
- 20001211X14680
- Case number
- LAX92LA200
- 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 1992-05-05.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 2ecca84f53c74f925c1cf9469a4cd3da9ee5541f86e8caef4e2951b71130eabb; retrieved 2026-09-23T03:11:04.673Z.