DEN00LA059 · Cessna 182P
Cessna 182P · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Garfield County Regional Airport (RIL) to Aspen-Pitkin County Airport (Sardy Field) (ASE)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN00LA059
- 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 182P
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 182
- 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
- N8236M
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Garfield County Regional Airport (RIL), Rifle, COTo Aspen-Pitkin County Airport (Sardy Field) (ASE), Aspen, CO
- 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
The airplane had just taken off from runway 26, was about two-thirds the way down the runway, and had climbed to 300 to 400 feet above the ground when the engine lost power. When the pilot switched the fuel pump to HIGH BOOST, power returned momentarily (2 to 5 seconds) and then was lost again. The pilot made a forced landing in the dirt median between the east and westbound lanes of an interstate highway. Disassembly and inspection of the engine disclosed no anomalies. The airplane was equipped with a Continental IO-470-F fuel injected engine, rated at 260 horsepower, in accordance with STC (supplemental type certificate) SA3825SW. The STC holder offered three scenarios that could result in a power loss: (1) Previous induction fires could weaken the duct containing the alternate air door which could become loose and block air to the engine. (2) Taking off with the fuel selector in the off position. (3) A loose line in the fuel system would allow air to be introduced, manifested by fluctuations on the fuel pressure gauge.
Probable cause
Loss of engine power for undetermined reasons. A factor was unsuitable terrain on which to make a forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN00LA059
- Event ID
- 20001212X20615
- Case number
- DEN00LA059
- 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: b12b6a2d89225c66f88736e24a5fd527ef8d983050d270bcb6abb6def1a4aa46; retrieved 2026-09-21T20:17:28.712Z.