BFO92LA090 · Cessna 152
Northstar Aero Services Cessna 152 · Accident: partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Ellington Airport (7B9) to Manchester-Boston Regional Airport (MHT)
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO92LA090
- 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 152
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 152
- 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
- N68215
- Operator
- Northstar Aero Services
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ellington Airport (7B9), Ellington, CTTo Manchester-Boston Regional Airport (MHT), Manchester, NH
- 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)
- 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
- Stall
- 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
- Engine assembly, cylinder › Cracked
- Pilot in command › Stall, inadvertent
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Woodstock, CT, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT WAS EN ROUTE TO HER DESTINATION WHEN SHE SAID, ' THE ENGINE SEEMED TO BE LOSING POWER, AND THE ENGINE HAD A SOFT ABNORMAL SOUND.' THE PILOT SAID SHE PERFORMED THE STANDARD EMERGENCY PROCEDURES WHICH INCLUDED THE USE OF CARBURETOR HEAT, BUT ALL WERE UNSUCCESSFUL. SHE STATED THAT SHE NOTICED AN AIRPORT BELOW HER, AND MADE TWO ATTEMPTS TO LAND, BUT WAS UNSUCCESSFUL. ON THE THIRD ATTEMPT THE AIRPLANE STALLED, AND STRUCK A 75 FOOT TREE BEFORE IT FELL TO THE GROUND. EXAMINATION OF THE AIRPLANE BY THE FAA REVEALED A QUARTER INCH CRACK IN THE NUMBER FOUR CYLINDER WHERE THE BARREL AND HEAD ARE JOINED. THE CYLINDER IS A CHROME PLATED CYLINDER AND IS REQUIRED BY THE ENGINE MANUFACTURER AS PER THE SERVICE LETTER TO BE OVERHAULED AT 2400 HOURS. THE ENGINE HAD ACCUMULATED 888 HOURS SINCE MAJOR OVERHAUL.
Probable cause
THE LOSS OF ENGINE POWER DUE TO A CRACKED CYLINDER AND THE INADVERTENT AERODYNAMIC STALL THAT OCCURRED DURING THE PRECUATIONARY LANDING.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO92LA090
- Event ID
- 20001211X15062
- Case number
- BFO92LA090
- 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: df704bb377380676173e1ce7ccffb5e9988d003643c30862caf4c277e137fd24; retrieved 2026-09-21T23:13:03.901Z.