DEN89LA115 · Cessna 182G
Montana-Wyoming Systems Cessna 182G · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From No airport to No airport
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN89LA115
- 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 182G
- 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
- N3410S
- Operator
- Montana-Wyoming Systems
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From No airportTo No airport
- 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)
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Engine assembly, piston › Disintegrated
- Pilot in command › Airspeed(vs), not maintained
- Pilot in command › Maneuver, excessive
- Pilot in command › Stall/mush, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PRIVATE PLT WAS LOOKING FOR COWS ON HIS RANCH, AT 200 FT AGL, WITH 20 DEG FLAPS. THE PLT SAID HE FLEW THE ACFT THROUGH A LIGHT RAIN SHOWER. THE PLT SAID THE ENGINE BEGAN TO MISS, AND HE REDUCED PWOER. THE ACFT BEGAN LOSING ALTITUDE AND HE ADDED POWER. THE ENGINE QUIT AND SMOKE ENTERED THE CABIN. THE PLT SAID HE BANKED THE ACFT AND IT STALLED. THE ACFT STRUCK THE GROUND AND THE NOSE GEAR COLLAPSED. THE WING STRUCK SAGE BRUSH AND THE ACFT NOSED DOWN. A POST ACCIDENT ENGINE TEARDOWN PROVIDED EVIDENCE THAT THE NUMBER TWO PISTON DISINTEGRATED. THE LOG BOOKS SHOWED THAT THE PISTON HAD BEEN IN SERVICE 662 HOURS.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN AIRSPEED WHILE MANEUVERING FOR A FORCED LANDING FOLLOWING A FAILURE OF THE NUMBER TWO PISTON. CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT WAS SMOKE IN THE COCKPIT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN89LA115
- Event ID
- 20001213X28291
- Case number
- DEN89LA115
- 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: ec69717f5991b1a1cf2c9e15474c0ab63b41420b63511dcbb5047be00f025407; retrieved 2026-09-23T07:38:55.702Z.