LAX00LA332 · Cessna 120
Cessna 120 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Sacramento Executive Airport (SAC) to Madera Municipal Airport (MAE)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX00LA332
- 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 120
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 120
- 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
- N76261
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sacramento Executive Airport (SAC)To Madera Municipal Airport (MAE), Madera, CA
- 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
- Pilot in command › Carburetor heat, improper use of
- Pilot in command › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
- Weather condition › Carburetor icing conditions
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
During the takeoff climb the airplane lost power and collided with the tops of trees during the ensuing emergency landing. The pilot stated there were no mechanical anomalies noted with the preflight, or taxi to the active runway. Prior to takeoff, the airport closed for about 5 minutes. About 4 minutes after the airport reopened, the pilot was cleared for takeoff. After takeoff the engine rpm's dropped. He suspected carburetor icing and applied the carburetor heat. The engine continued to lose power. His intent was to land in-between trees on a golf course. At the last minute he had to maneuver the airplane to avoid a golf cart. He attempted to stall the airplane into the tops of the trees. Witnesses to the accident heard the engine sputtering. At the accident site fuel was found in the left tank, and on the ground underneath the right wing. The airframe and power plant were examined. The fuel selector was stiff to move and the main discharge nozzle was leaking and stained. The carburetor heat control cable retainer bolt washer, and the mixture control cable rod end retainer bolt were both loose. The carburetor was inspected and found in noncompliance with airworthiness directives. No further mechanical anomalies were noted with the airframe, power plant, or carburetor. Conditions at the time of the accident were conducive to carburetor icing.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate preflight planning and his improper use of carburetor heat that resulted in a loss of engine power due to carburetor icing following a delayed takeoff in conditions that were conducive to carburetor icing. A factor was the nonsuitable terrain for landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX00LA332
- Event ID
- 20001212X22008
- Case number
- LAX00LA332
- 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: 0abdbd6c6a51db4dbafe19b91484549edea7a2697013654ab6b3d780d55140a2; retrieved 2026-09-22T12:27:55.972Z.