BFO91LA052 · Piper PA-22-150
Piper PA-22-150 · Accident: loss of engine power during initial climb
From Elkins-Randolph County Regional Airport (EKN) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO91LA052
- 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-22-150
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-22
- 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
- N6904B
- Operator
- Allen D Chenoweth · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Elkins-Randolph County Regional Airport (EKN), Elkins, WVTo 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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 · Estimated position: the centre of Elkins, WV, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE STUDENT PILOT HAD COMPLETED TWO PRACTICE TOUCH AND GO LANDINGS ON RUNWAY 32 AND HAD JUST LIFTED OFF THE RUNAY FOR A THIRD, WHEN THE ENGINE UNEXPECTEDLY STOPPED RUNNING. HE QUICKLY CHECKED HIS FUEL GAUGES, MAGNETO SWITCH AND SWITCHED THE FUEL TANK SELECTOR WITH NO SUCESS. SINCE THE TERRAIN STRAIGHT AHEAD WAS UNSUITABLE, HE ELECTED TO MAKE A 100 DEGREE GLIDING LEFT TURN AND LANDED IN AN OPEN AREA. AT THE END OF HIS 200 FOOT GROUND ROLL, THE AIRCRAT STRUCK A FENCE POST AND TIPPED ON IT'S NOSE AND CAME TO A STOP INVERTED.
Probable cause
THE LOSS OF ENGINE POWER FOR UNDETERMINED REASONS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO91LA052
- Event ID
- 20001212X16932
- Case number
- BFO91LA052
- 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 1991-06-01.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 8a1dfc47a896ba9565a8e975d7f049461beec74e51c3fcd21b203543258abff5; retrieved 2026-09-23T04:08:13.506Z.