SEA92LA158 · Piper PA-23-160
Piper PA-23-160 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From St George Regional Airport (SGU) to Burley Municipal Airport (BYI)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA92LA158
- 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 PA-23-160
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-23
- 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
- N4317P
- Operator
- Wesley F. Johnson · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From St George Regional Airport (SGU), ST. GEORGE, UTTo Burley Municipal Airport (BYI), Burley, ID
- 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
- Approach
- 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
- Total 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 exhaustion
- 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 › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Fuel consumption calculations, inaccurate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PIPER PA 23 160 SUSTAINED SUBSTANTIAL DAMAGE WHEN IT LANDED ABOUT A HALF MILE SHORT OF THE RUNWAY AT BURLEY, IDAHO, AFTER A LOSS OF POWER IN BOTH ENGINES. THE PILOT HAD JUST COMPLETED A GO AROUND AND WAS ON HIS SECOND APPROACH, AT THE CONCLUSION OF A FLIGHT FROM ST. GEORGE, UT. FAA INSPECTORS INSPECTED THE AIRCRAFT AND ATTRIBUTED THE POWER LOSS TO BOTH ENGINES TO HAVE BEEN FROM FUEL EXHAUSTION. THE AIRCRAFT HAD BEEN ALOFT FOR LESS THAN 3.5 HOURS. NORMAL CRUISE FUEL CONSUMPTION IS 16 GPH. THE AIRCRAFT HAD BEEN FUELED TO A TOTAL OF 72 GALLONS BEFORE DEPARTURE. CALM WIND RANGE OF THE AIRCRAFT IS APPROXIMATELY 600 NAUTICAL MILES WITH VFR RESERVES. AIRWAY DISTANCE FOR THIS FLIGHT IS 388 KNOTS; OR 320 KNOTS DIRECT. THE CAUSE OF EXCESSIVE FUEL CONSUMPTION WAS NOT DETERMINED.
Probable cause
FUEL EXHAUSTION WHEN ANTICIPATED FUEL CONSUMPTION WAS NOT ADEQUATELY CALCULATED.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA92LA158
- Event ID
- 20001211X15260
- Case number
- SEA92LA158
- 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 1992-07-21.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 45dc69568328227bd3137664649c0a724a21256cf8c362fb79882eff9a29f9d4; retrieved 2026-09-23T02:55:33.460Z.