LAX91LA266 · Grumman HU-16E
Pacific Flying Fish Grumman HU-16E · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Santa Barbara Municipal Airport (SBA) to Kahului International Airport (PHOG)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX91LA266
- 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
Grumman HU-16E
- Aircraft type
- Grumman HU-16
- 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
- N7029C
- Operator
- Pacific Flying Fish
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Santa Barbara Municipal Airport (SBA), Santa Barbara, CATo Kahului International Airport (PHOG), MAUI, HI
- 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
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Touchdown, improper
Not plotted · Location withheld: coordinates are missing, conflicting, invalid, or have no accepted acquisition method. No substitute location has been invented.
NTSB narrative
DURING CRUISE FLIGHT THE ACCIDENT AIRCRAFT LOST OIL PRESSURE IN THE NUMBER 2 ENGINE. FLIGHT COULD NOT BE SUSTAINED USING THE REMAINING ENGINE. ACCORDING TO THE PILOT, THE REMAINING ENGINE WOULD OVERHEAT WHEN POWER WAS APPLIED. THE CREW DESCENDED TO JUST ABOVE THE WATER AND TRIED TO FLY THE AIRCRAFT IN GROUND EFFECT, BUT TO NO AVAIL. THEY ELECTED TO DITCH THE AIRCRAFT. DURING THE LANDING, THE AIRCRAFT RECEIVED SUBSTANTIAL DAMAGE AND WAS ALMOST IMMEDIATELY FLOODED, CAUSING THE AIRCRAFT TO SINK. THE CREW ESCAPED, BUT DID NOT HAVE TIME TO RETRIEVE EMERGENCY GEAR. THEY WERE RESCUED AFTER ABOUT 20 HOURS IN THE WATER. EVIDENCE REVEALED THAT THE PILOT DID NOT HAVE A PILOT'S CERTIFICATE. NO EVIDENCE COULD BE FOUND TO INDICATE THAT THE PILOT HAD ANY EXPERIENCE IN THE ACCIDENT AIRCRAFT OR WITH ANY SEA PLANE. SINCE THE AIRCRAFT SANK, A CAUSE FOR THE ENGINE PROBLEMS COULD NOT BE DETERMINED.
Probable cause
IMPROPER TOUCHDOWN IN THE WATER CAUSING SUBSTANTIAL DAMAGE. LOSS OF POWER ON THE NUMBER 2 ENGINE AND THE PILOT'S LACK OF QUALIFICATIONS WERE FACTORS IN THE ACCIDENT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX91LA266
- Event ID
- 20001212X17317
- Case number
- LAX91LA266
- 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 1991-06-19.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 1990718ec7e7ee2d6530bc81ce919f0d0dbb42f416b43fc0376fdf05f37592d0; retrieved 2026-09-21T15:25:22.331Z.