LAX00LA202 · Beech 35-B33
Glendale Aviation Beech 35-B33 · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Glendale Municipal Airport (GEU) to Harry Reid International Airport (LAS)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX00LA202
- 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
Beech 35-B33
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 35
- 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
- N9591Y
- Operator
- Glendale Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Glendale Municipal Airport (GEU), Glendale, AZTo Harry Reid International Airport (LAS), Las Vegas, NV
- 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
- Total loss of engine power (mechanical failure)
- 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
- Engine assembly, bearing › Overtemperature
- Engine assembly, connecting rod › Separation
- Fluid, oil › Loss, total
- Lubricating system, oil line › Fractured
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane collided with a berm during a forced landing following a catastrophic engine failure as the airplane descended toward the destination airport. The pilot reported that the flight was uneventful until they were preparing to start a descent over Lake Mead. Suddenly a loud 'pop or clunk' noise came from the engine compartment and the engine began to vibrate and run roughly, then quit altogether. This was accompanied by a large amount of smoke. The pilot setup for a landing on a paved model airplane field and landed successfully; however, he could not stop the airplane prior to colliding with a berm and collapsing the landing gear. Following recovery of the aircraft, the engine was examined by an FAA airworthiness inspector. A large hole was observed in the upper left rear engine case in the area of the Nos. 1 and 2 connecting rods. The No. 2 connecting rod had separated from the crankshaft with the journal end severely peened and damaged. The rod end was protruding from the hole in the case. The No. 2 bearing insert was destroyed, with heat discoloration noted on the journal saddle. The corresponding portion of the crankshaft was also heat discolored and scored. The inspector observed that the oil pressure line from the engine to the Hobbs meter pressure switch was broken at the switch's fitting. Oil was noted covering the engine compartment area around the broken fitting.
Probable cause
The fracture and separation of the oil pressure line fitting, which resulted in a loss of oil and an oil starvation failure of the engine.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX00LA202
- Event ID
- 20001212X21048
- Case number
- LAX00LA202
- 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 2000-05-21.
- API snapshot SHA-256: e5b20246a6ae3b1339d46b7093d943f362dc7d56cdb5ec8942f2dd354fa141bd; retrieved 2026-09-22T12:52:58.224Z.