ATL86LA099 · Piper PA-28R-180
Piper PA-28R-180 · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Southwest Georgia Regional Airport (ABY) to Blue Grass Airport (LEX)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL86LA099
- 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
Piper PA-28R-180
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N7613J
- Operator
- Oldach, Albert J. JR · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Southwest Georgia Regional Airport (ABY), Albany, GATo Blue Grass Airport (LEX), Lexington, KY
- 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Fluid, oil › Leak
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, alignment, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
ON TAKEOFF THE PLT SAW AN OIL LEAK AROUND THE PROP HUB. THE ACFT WAS RETURNED TO THE AIRPORT AND THE PROP GOVERNOR OIL TUBE FITTING WAS FOUND TO BE CRACKED. THE PART WAS REPLACED AND THE FLT WAS CONTINUED. THE PART WAS CHECKED DURING A LATER REFUELING STOP AND WAS NOT FOUND TO BE LEAKING. DURING CRUISE IN MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN AN OIL LEAK WAS AGAIN SEEN. VECTORS WERE RECEIVED TO A NEARBY ARPT. THE ENG QUIT AND THE PLT ATTEMPTED AN EMERGENCY LANDING DURING WHICH THE ACFT STRUCK A TREE. EXAMINATION OF THE ENG SHOWED THAT THE OIL LINE FITTING HAD AGAIN CRACKED. BOTH FITTINGS WERE FOUND BY METALLURGICAL EXAMINATION TO HAVE FAILED DUE TO A LOW STRESS HIGH CYCLE FATIGUE INDUCED BY A HIGH MEAN TENSILE STRESS. THE OIL LINE WAS FOUND TO BE UNRESTRAINED ALTHOUGH THE SERVICE MANUAL CALLS FOR TWO CLAMPS. THE RESULTING VIBRATION INDUCED THE STRESS LOADS AS SEEN ON THE TWO FITTINGS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL86LA099
- Event ID
- 20001213X32987
- Case number
- ATL86LA099
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1986-03-18.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 93c50d009190940faeaf2b715174b5d4de0096de1294b53add28e7ac9908a8ee; retrieved 2026-09-23T14:56:57.461Z.