DEN02LA033 · Cessna 172Q
Cessna 172Q · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Roosevelt Municipal Airport (74V) to 36U · Heber City, UT
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN02LA033
- 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
Cessna 172Q
- 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
- N66076
- Operator
- Wings of Denver
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Roosevelt Municipal Airport (74V), Roosevelt, UTTo 36U · Heber City, UT
- 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 (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
- 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 › Carburetor heat, not selected
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot purchased 36 gallons of avgas at 1813 and departed the airport approximately 1830. Approximately 1850, while in cruise flight, the engine "sputtered and ran rough then quit." During descent, severe turbulence was encountered and the airplane possibly entered a spin. The pilot sighted a clearing and made a forced landing in deep snow and at night. There was no odor of fuel or fuel stains at the accident site. When the airplane was removed from the site, about two or three gallons of fuel leaked onto the floor of the trailer. At the salvage yard, water was used to fill both fuel tanks. Neither integral fuel tank was breached. The fuel vent lines, check valve, fuel selector valve, fuel supply lines, and auxiliary fuel pump were unremarkable. The gascolator was not damaged and contained no fuel. The fuel screen was clean and free of debris. There were no fuel stains anywhere on the airframe. About two ounces residual fuel were drained from the carburetor. According to the engine manufacturer's investigator, "the spark plugs and exhaust system gas path exhibited dark black coloration consistent with engine operation at rich fuel/air mixture operation." Weather recorded at a remote station near the accident site was as follows: temperature, 23 degrees F.; dew point, 16 degrees F.; relative humidity, 74%; wind, 070 degrees at 6 miles per hour, gusting to 10 miles per hour. According to the "Icing Probability Chart," conditions were conducive for the formation of carburetor ice in glide and cruise power configurations.
Probable cause
the pilot's failure to apply carburetor heat. Contributing factors included carburetor icing conditions, the unavailability of suitable terrain on which to make a forced landing, and night conditions.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN02LA033
- Event ID
- 20020410X00486
- Case number
- DEN02LA033
- 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, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2002-03-16.
- API snapshot SHA-256: afcd5a6b53cf39427b7a12747abf2ae079e73b7e8e8baa4679c09ac689e876d8; retrieved 2026-09-21T09:41:19.637Z.