LAX01LA180 · Piper PA18-150
Piper PA18-150 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From El Tiro Gliderport (AZ67) to El Tiro Gliderport (AZ67)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX01LA180
- 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
- Unknown
- 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 PA18-150
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA18
- 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
- N8524Y
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From El Tiro Gliderport (AZ67), Tucson, AZTo El Tiro Gliderport (AZ67), Tucson, AZ
- 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)
- 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
- Fuel starvation
- 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 › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane lost engine power and collided with an airport perimeter fence, a tree, and the ground. The purpose of the flight was to make sure the airplane was in working order for the day's glider tow activities. The accident flight was the first flight of the day. A preflight inspection was conducted, which included visually verifying the fuel selector position, which was found pointing towards the left. The position of the fuel selector appeared correct to the pilot. No discrepancies were noted with the startup, run-up, or takeoff roll. During climb out the airplane lost engine power. The pilot attempted to slip the airplane down to the runway. The pilot stopped the slip and tried to make it over the perimeter fence. He placed his hand on the fuel selector and noted that it was out of position. He repositioned the fuel selector, the engine quit, and the airplane landed short of the perimeter fence. During the rollout the airplane contacted trees, the right main landing gear collapsed, and the airplane came to rest upright past the fence. The pilot indicated that the he had been flying a Cessna 140, which has a similar fuel selector handle, but works in the opposite direction. He stated that he hadn't flown the Super Cub as often during the year and most of his experience was in the Cessna 140.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate preflight inspection, which included verifying the position of the fuel selector handle, which subsequently led to fuel starvation and a forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX01LA180
- Event ID
- 20010604X01072
- Case number
- LAX01LA180
- 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, coordinates. 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: 93e3ebaf30ccf2fcdcd647217d495ef62fc30fb4948b329886ed1841964db0c5; retrieved 2026-09-22T11:57:23.721Z.