FTW91LA120 · Piper PA-23
Bourland Field Piper PA-23 · Accident: loss of engine power on approach
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW91LA120
- 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
- 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
- N289RL
- Operator
- Bourland Field
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern downwind
- 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(cfi) › Propeller feathering, not performed
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
BOTH PILOTS WERE MULTIENGINE RATED AND CFI'S. THE SECOND PILOT WAS RECEIVING INSTRUCTION IN PREPARATION FOR HIS MULTIENGINE INSTRUCTOR CERTIFICATE. THEY REPORTED THAT DURING TAKEOFF THE LEFT ENGINE WOULD NOT DEVELOPE FULL POWER, AND THAT DURING THE DOWNWIND LEG OF THE CLOSED TRAFFIC PATTERN THE AIRPLANE WOULD NOT SUSTAIN FLIGHT. THE INSTRUCTOR PILOT SENSED THE ENGINE HAD LOST POWER BUT HE DID NOT FEATHER THE PROPELLER; HE RELIED ON THE MANIFOLD GAUGE TO INDICATE ENGINE CONDITION. THE INSTRUCTOR PILOT EXECUTED A FORCED LANDING AND ATTEMPTED TO RETURN TO THE DEPARTURE RUNWAY. THE AIRPLANE IMPACTED THE TERRAIN IN A 45 DEGREE LEFT BANK, 15 DEGREES NOSE LOW, SHORT OF INTENDED LANDING POINT WITHOUT THE PILOT ATTEMPTING TO FLARE. THE AIRPLANE WAS DESTROYED BY A POST CRASH FIRE. NO CAUSE FOR THE POWER LOSS TO THE LEFT ENGINE WAS FOUND.
Probable cause
A LOSS OF ENGINE POWER FOR UNKNOWN REASONS AND THE FAILURE OF THE CERTIFIED FLIGHT INSTRUCTOR/PILOT-IN-COMMAND TO FEATHER THE PROPELLER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW91LA120
- Event ID
- 20001212X17556
- Case number
- FTW91LA120
- 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: d2c458c88c257ba4c7af98331c8e7226c0cce14a60dd7bd3cd9b8aa8ed301a9b; retrieved 2026-09-21T15:24:03.280Z.