LAX91LA365 · Piper PA-38-112
Piper PA-38-112 · Accident: missing aircraft
From Oceano County Airport (L52) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX91LA365
- 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
- 2 · 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
- Unknown
Piper PA-38-112
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-38
- 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
- N2526C
- Operator
- Troy Dunn JR
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Oceano County Airport (L52), Oceano, CATo 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
- Unknown
- 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
- Missing aircraft
- 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
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ACFT'S TAKEOFF WAS NOT OBSERVED FROM THE UNCONTROLLED AIRPORT, AND THE ACFT'S OWNER/PILOT DID NOT RECEIVE ANY SERVICES FROM AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL DURING THE ACCIDENT FLIGHT. WHEN THE PILOT'S SON, WHO WAS ON BOARD THE ACFT, FAILED TO RETURN HOME HIS FAMILY BECAME CONCERNED AND A SEARCH COMMENCED. THREE DAYS LATER HIS BODY WASHED UP ON A PACIFIC OCEAN BEACH, ABOUT NINE MILES SOUTH OF WHERE THE ACFT HAD BEEN BASED AND WAS LAST OBSERVED. NEAR THE BODY, A WHEEL AND A SEAT CUSHION WERE ALSO FOUND. THE TIME OF THE ACFT ACCIDENT WAS NOT DETERMINED, NO ADDITIONAL WRECKAGE HAS BEEN LOCATED, AND THE BODY OF THE OWNER/PILOT REMAINS MISSING. TOXICOLOGICAL EVIDENCE FROM THE SON'S BODY DID NOT INDICATE THE PRESENCE OF CYANIDE OR CARBON MONOXIDE POISONING. THE FATHER AND SON OCCUPANTS OF THE ACFT BOTH POSSESSED EXPIRED STUDENT PILOT CERTIFICATES. THE ACFT HAD BEEN MAINTAINED ON AN ANNUAL INSPECTION PROGRAM, AND THE ELT'S BATTERY REPLACEMENT DATE WAS CURRENT. NO ELT SIGNAL WAS RECEIVED.
Probable cause
UNKNOWN. THE MAIN AIRPLANE WRECKAGE AND THE BODY OF THE PILOT ARE PRESUMED LOST AT SEA.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX91LA365
- Event ID
- 20001212X17907
- Case number
- LAX91LA365
- 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: d5282d05613dc346450937274b9183db3ab2d2bd3480f3eb11afe1b2ef308267; retrieved 2026-09-21T01:37:20.588Z.