SEA87LA188 · Mercer OWL RACER 65-2 OWL RACER
Jefferey Sawyer & Mercer OWL RACER 65-2 OWL RACER · Accident: loss of engine power
From 4SD to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA87LA188
- 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
- 1 · 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
Mercer OWL RACER 65-2 OWL RACER
- Aircraft type
- Mercer OWL RACER 65-2
- 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
- N5JG
- Operator
- Jefferey Sawyer &
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 4SDTo 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
- Other
- 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
- 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/spin
- 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 › Airspeed, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Stall/spin, inadvertent
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DRG A PRACTICE FLT IN A FORMULA ONE RACER BFR THE RENO AIR RACES, THE ENG LOST PWR AFTER 4 LAPS WHEN THE ACFT WAS AT AN ALT OF ABOUT 40' AGL. THE PLT MANEUVERED TO LND ON A RWY IN WINDS THAT WERE VARIABLE & GUSTY. A WITNESS RPRTD THE PLT MADE AN ABRUPT LEFT TURN, WHILE MANEUVERING TO LND, THEN THE ACFT 'APPEARED TO STALL, SNAP ROLL TO THE RIGHT AND DIVE VERTICALLY INTO THE GROUND.' NO PREIMPACT PART FAILURE OR MALFUNCTION WAS FND DRG AN EXAM OF THE WRECKAGE. THE FUEL & OIL TANKS RUPTURED DRG IMPACT. NO EVIDENCE OF STAIN OR ODOR WAS NOTED & THE FUEL TANK WAS DRY; HOWEVER, 1 PERSON RPRTD HE WITNESSED THE 'DIP STICKING' OF THE FUEL TANK BFR THE ACDNT & SAID FUEL WAS AT THE 3/4 LVL. THE PLT HAD 3 YRS EXPERIENCE OF FLYING FORMULA ONE RACERS. ON THE ACDNT FLT HE WAS CHECKING A NEWLY INSTALLED ENG. ON THE DAY BFR THE ACDNT, HE MADE A DEAD-STICK LNDG AT THE SAME ARPT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA87LA188
- Event ID
- 20001213X32215
- Case number
- SEA87LA188
- 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: 1afdc55567eb784e1fe9fb74942f0531f9dda3a97580a660f5ef79f90573fb75; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:58:48.261Z.