ATL87LA197 · Cessna 172G
Cessna 172G · Accident: loss of engine power on approach
From Bay Bridge Airport (W29) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL87LA197
- 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 172G
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N1162F
- Operator
- W. H. Buttrill · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Bay Bridge Airport (W29), Chester, MDTo 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
- Approach · VFR pattern final
- 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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
- Pilot in command › Carburetor heat, improper use of
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DURING APPROACH THE PILOT NOTICED THAT HE WAS TOO HIGH AND FAST FOR A NORMAL APPROACH. HE REDUCED POWER AND SLOWED THE AIRCRAFT AND INCREASED THE DESCENT RATE TO ATTEMPT THE LANDING. WHEN HE ATTEMPTED TO ADD POWER AND ARREST THE INCREASING DESCENT RATE THE ENGINE FAILED TO RESPOND. THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE APPLIED CARBURETOR HEAT AFTER THE LACK OF RESPONSE. THE CONDITIONS WERE SUCH THAT SERIOUS ICE BUILD UP COULD BE EXPECTED. NO MECHANICAL PROBLEMS WERE FOUND WITH THE ENGINE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL87LA197
- Event ID
- 20001213X31389
- Case number
- ATL87LA197
- 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: 85e7ec84fc76baa8e02a9c4527e61daf35004a07391ef8e39cb5b8ad68e107fa; retrieved 2026-09-22T00:49:31.064Z.