MKC89FA196 · Piper PA-32-300
Piper PA-32-300 · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) on approach
From Bartlesville Municipal Airport (BVO) to Springdale Municipal Airport (ASG)
Event
- NTSB case
- MKC89FA196
- 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
- 2 · 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
- Charter & commuter
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Piper PA-32-300
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-32
- 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
- N8995N
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Bartlesville Municipal Airport (BVO), Bartlesville, OKTo Springdale Municipal Airport (ASG), Springdale, AR
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- Approach · IFR initial approach
- 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
- Tree(s)
- 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
- Engine assembly, connecting rod › Failure, total
- Fluid, oil › Starvation
- Lubricating system, oil hose › Disconnected
- Lubricating system, oil hose › Loose
- Maintenance, inspection › Not attained
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Bentonville, AR, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE PLT WAS USING A COMPANY ACFT THAT HAD BEEN SVCD WITH NEW FLEX OIL HOSES, BUT THE COMPANY MECHANIC HAD NOT COMPLETED THE INSTALLATION BEFORE LEAVING WORK FOR THE DAY. HE (THE MECHANIC) HAD DEFERRED COMPLETION OF THE WORK UNTIL THE FLWG MONDAY. RPRTDLY, A LEAK CHK OF THE OIL HOSES WAS ACCOMPLISHED BY THE PLT, BUT A LOG OF THIS WAS NOT ENTERED IN THE MAINT RECORD BEFORE THE FLT. DRG AN ILS LOC APCH, THE PLT RPRTD A LOSS OF OIL PRESSURE. SUBSEQUENTLY, A CONNECTING ROD IN THE ENG FAILED FM LACK OF LUBRICATION & THE ACFT CRASHED INTO TREES DRG AN EMERG LNDG. AN INSPN OF THE ACFT REVEALED A DISCONNECTED OIL HOSE BETWEEN 2 OIL COOLERS. THE HOSE HAD VIBRATED FREE FM A FITTING & OIL HAD BEEN PUMPED OVERBOARD. THE OTR OIL HOSES WERE STILL SECURELY FASTENED.
Probable cause
A LOOSE OIL LINE THAT BECAME DISCONNECTED, WHEN MAINTENANCE/INSPECTION OF THE AIRCRAFT HAD NOT BEEN COMPLETED, WHICH RESULTED IN LOSS OF ENGINE OIL AND SUBSEQUENT FAILURE OF THE CONNECTING ROD FROM LACK OF LUBRICATION. A FACTOR RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WAS: INADEQUATE SURVEILLANCE OF THE OPERATION BY COMPANY/MANAGEMENT PERSONNEL.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MKC89FA196
- Event ID
- 20001213X29456
- Case number
- MKC89FA196
- 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: 94bfcf306c08ccdb64f7911458a3989490f7a2b1edde9e569489d6dc2390e5a1; retrieved 2026-09-18T14:08:08.587Z.