LAX90FA111 · American AA-1
American AA-1 · Accident: in flight collision with terrain/water en route
From Borrego Valley Airport (L08) to Gillespie Field (SEE)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX90FA111
- 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
American AA-1
- Aircraft type
- American AA-1
- 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
- N5655L
- Operator
- Puffer, Gene L. · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Borrego Valley Airport (L08), BOREGO SPRINGS, CATo Gillespie Field (SEE), El Cajon, 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
- En route · climb to 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
- In flight collision with terrain/water
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Stall/mush
- 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 › Airspeed, not maintained
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › Proper altitude, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Stall/mush, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ACFT HAD FLOWN 228 HRS, SINCE THE ENG WAS OVERHAULED. THE OVERHAUL WAS DONE BY THE OWNERS & SIGNED OFF BY AN A & P MECH. DRG THE OVERHAUL, THE CAM SHAFT WAS GROUND & THE TAPPETS RESURFACED. THE LYCOMING O/H MANUAL STATED THAT IF THE CAM SHAFT WAS REPLACED OR REGROUND, NEW TAPPETS MUST BE INSTALLED TO PREVENT SEVERE WEAR & SPALLING OF THE CAM LOBES & TAPPET BODIES. EXAM OF THE ENG REVEALED THAT THE CAM LOBES & TAPPETS FOR THE #1 & #2 CYLS WERE SEVERELY SPALLED & WORN DOWN TO ABOUT HALF THE NORMAL PROFILE. LYC TECH REPS SAID THE CAM LOBE WEAR WOULD CHANGE THE DURATION & AMOUNT OF VALVE ACTION, REDUCING THE POWER OUTPUT ABILITY. OTR DISCREPANCIES WERE FOUND DURING THE EXAM OF THE ENG. AFTER DEPG, THE ACFT CLIMBED TOWARD THE MTNS. THE TRRN RISE WAS ABOUT 470 FT/MI & THE ACFT WAS CAPABLE OF CLIMBING AT ABOUT 350 FT/MI. WITNESSES SAW THE ACFT APCH THE MTN RIDGE LOW & SLOW, THEN TURN LEFT AS IT BEGAN A DSCNT TO THE GND. HIGH WINDS WERE BLOWING ACROSS THE RIDGE AT THE TIME & CLOUDS TOPPED THE MTNS.
Probable cause
IMPROPER IN-FLIGHT PLANNING/DECISION BY THE PILOT, AND HIS FAILURE TO MAINTAIN SUFFICIENT AIRSPEED AND ALTITUDE, WHICH RESULTED IN A STALL/MUSH INTO RISING MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: THE TERRAIN AND WEATHER CONDITIONS, AND FAILURE OF THE ENGINE TO PROVIDE FULL POWER, DUE TO IMPROPER MAINTENANCE AND SUBSEQUENT WEAR OF THE CAM LOBES & TAPPETS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX90FA111
- Event ID
- 20001212X22732
- Case number
- LAX90FA111
- 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: 9a16fe956ec7e317c4f513d887a9c16a339fa9b0440af999f6baff4b7c1f6471; retrieved 2026-09-21T15:44:38.064Z.