ATL90LA005 · Cessna 120
Cessna 120 · Accident: partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From KY29 · FARRINGTON, KY to Greater Portsmouth Regional Airport (PMH)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL90LA005
- 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 120
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 120
- 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
- N1829N
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From KY29 · FARRINGTON, KYTo Greater Portsmouth Regional Airport (PMH), Portsmouth, OH
- 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
- Partial 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
- Wire, static
- 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
- Pilot in command › Maintenance, inspection, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
ENGINE LOST POWER WHEN ALL OIL WAS LOST FROM ENGINE IN FLIGHT THROUGH HOLE IN ROCKER BOX COVER WHICH WAS RESULT OF 5 OF 6 SECURING SCREWS BEING MISSING AND COVER VIBRATING AGAINST ROCK ARM. AIRCRAFT COLLIDED WITH POWERLINES DURING SUBSEQUENT FORCED LANDING. PLT/OWNER STATED HE HAD INSPECTED ALL NUTS AND BOLTS 16 FLIGHT HOURS BEFORE ACCIDENT.
Probable cause
THE IMPROPER INSPECTION OF THE AIRPLANES ENGINE BY THE PILOT/OWNER RESULTING IN FIVE ROCKER BOX COVER SCREWS BEING MISSING AND SUBSEQUENT LOSS OF ENGINE OIL DUE TO THE COVER VIBRATING AND CAUSING A HOLE TO BE WORN IN IT. SUBSEQUENT LOSS OF ENGINE POWER DUE TO LOSS OF ENGINE OIL RESULTED IN A FORCE LANDING AT WHICH TIME THE AIRPLANE COLLIDED WITH POWER LINES.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL90LA005
- Event ID
- 20001213X29529
- Case number
- ATL90LA005
- 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: 04efb389484daf3fbaa9d9aa14d8b38c44e3fe554f90ad2a1019b71215262c35; retrieved 2026-09-22T00:01:14.071Z.