SEA92LA180 · Cessna R172K
Pocatello Avcenter Cessna R172K · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA92LA180
- 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 R172K
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N736PS
- Operator
- Pocatello Avcenter
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- 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
- Total loss of engine power (non-mechanical)
- 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
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DURING THE INITIAL CLIMB, THE AIRPLANE ATTAINED AN ALTITUDE OF APPROXIMATELY 200 FEET AGL WHEN THE ENGINE LOST PARTIAL POWER AND THE CFI NOTED A LOW FUEL FLOW. THE CFI ORDERED THE SECOND PILOT TO REDUCE POWER, WHICH THE PILOT DID. THE CFI THEN DECIDED THAT THERE WASN'T SUFFICIENT ROOM LEFT TO LAND ON THE REMAINING RUNWAY AND ORDERED THE SECOND PILOT TO ADD FULL THROTTLE AND ACTIVATE THE ELECTRIC FUEL PUMP TO TRY AND RESTORE POWER TO GO-AROUND. THE CFI TOOK OVER THE CONTROLS AND MADE A RIGHT TURN AWAY FROM THE RUNWAY. POWER WAS NOT RESTORED AND THE CFI MADE A FORCED LANDING OFF THE RUNWAY. THE AIRPLANE TOUCHED DOWN IN A GRASSY AREA BETWEEN RUNWAYS, TRAVELLED ACROSS ANOTHER RUNWAY AND COLLIDED WITH A DITCH ON THE OPPOSITE SIDE. THE AIRPLANE CAME TO REST INVERTED. DURING THE POST-CRASH INSPECTION, THE ENGINE WAS PREPARED FOR AN ENGINE RUN. THE ENGINE STARTED IMMEDIATELY AND WAS RUN FOR SEVERAL MINUTES, WITH NO INDICATION OF A MECHANICAL FAILURE OR MALFUNCTION.
Probable cause
AN UNDETERMINED LOSS OF ENGINE POWER. A FACTOR TO THE ACCIDENT WAS: AN IN FLIGHT PLANNING/DECISION DELAY.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA92LA180
- Event ID
- 20001211X15537
- Case number
- SEA92LA180
- 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 1992-08-17.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 93a64ac5e6b76f8d6e9563bf6dc6f436f4834db67d887d5e62d0136b9f8a87e1; retrieved 2026-09-21T23:09:46.283Z.