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SEA89LA174 · de Havilland BEAVER DHC-2 MK.1 BEAVER DHC

17 Sept 1989 · KAPOWSIN, WA, United States

Kapowsin Air Sports de Havilland BEAVER DHC-2 MK.1 BEAVER DHC · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb

From Kapowsin Field (86WA) to an unrecorded destination

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Event

NTSB case
SEA89LA174
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

de Havilland BEAVER DHC-2 MK.1 BEAVER DHC

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
N5163G
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Kapowsin Field (86WA), KAPOWSIN, WATo 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
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

No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.

Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Kapowsin, WA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.

NTSB narrative

DURING THE INITIAL CLIMB AFTER ALL SYSTEM AND ENGINE GAGES INDICATED NORMAL OPERATION, AT 200 FEET AGL, THE ENGINE QUIT. THE PILOT SWITCHED FUEL TANKS AND RESTARTED THE ENGINE. THE ENGINE RAN FOR TEN SECONDS THEN QUIT. A FORCED LANDING WAS MADE WHERE DURING THE LANDING ROLL, THE AIRPLANE NOSED OVER. POST CRASH INSPECTION OF THE ENGINE DID NOT REVEAL A MECHANICAL FAILURE OR MALFUNCTION.

Probable cause

AN UNDETERMINED LOSS OF ENGINE POWER.

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record SEA89LA174
Event ID
20001213X29503
Case number
SEA89LA174
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: 845804c425d8934486e1013a9e8bd720ee9c6a953bfae808cc67a5dcb80fca84; retrieved 2026-09-21T15:49:18.236Z.