LAX88DUG01 · Smith DSA-1
Smith DSA-1 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during an emergency descent
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX88DUG01
- 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
Smith DSA-1
- Aircraft type
- Smith DSA-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
- N2Q
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo 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
- Emergency descent
- 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)
- 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
- Fuel starvation
- 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
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Fuel system, carburetor float › Locked
- Pilot in command › Maintenance, adjustment, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE HAD PERFORMED A MODERATE TO SEVERE 'NOSEOVER' AT 4000 FT AGL. THE ENGINE STARTED TO RUN ROUGH AND THEN QUIT. THE PILOT STATED THAT HE HAD PERFORMED MAINTENANCE ON THE CARBURETOR JUST PRIOR TO THIS FLIGHT. AN EMERGENCY LANDING WAS MADE NEAR THE AIRPORT WHERE THE AIRCRAFT COLLIDED WITH A PERIMETER FENCE AND A DIRT EMBANKMENT. DURING THE POSTACCIDENT INSPECTION OF THE ENGINE NO MECHANICAL FAILURES OR MALFUNCTIONS WERE FOUND. THE CARBURETOR FLOATBOWL WAS FOUND EMPTY OF FUEL, HOWEVER, AND THE FUEL LINE TO THE CARBURETOR CONTAINED FUEL AND WAS UNRESTRICTED. THE FUEL TANK HELD APRX 5 GALS OF FUEL. THE AIRCRAFT WAS NOT EQUIPPED WITH AN INVERTED FLIGHT CARBURETOR/FUEL SYSTEM. A STUCK CARBURETOR FLOAT WOULD HAVE CAUSED THE DESCRIBED POWER LOSS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX88DUG01
- Event ID
- 20001213X24913
- Case number
- LAX88DUG01
- 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: cac44cf4a0b1b370a59d4c486f5598e523c675053f20d1d9363614e455feb292; retrieved 2026-09-22T00:39:53.391Z.