SEA82DA135 · Mooney M20F
Mooney M20F · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Country Squire Airpark (S48) to Country Squire Airpark (S48)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA82DA135
- 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
Mooney M20F
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N9707M
- Operator
- Wright Custom Products
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Country Squire Airpark (S48), Sandy, ORTo Country Squire Airpark (S48), Sandy, OR
- 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 · climb to 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
- Fuel contamination
- 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, fuel › Water
- Pilot in command › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AFTER THE ENGINE WAS OVERHAULED, THE PILOT AND A MECHANIC TOOK OFF ON A TEST FLIGHT. DURING THE TAKEOFF CLIMB THE ENGINE LOST POWER AND WHEN FORCE LANDED ON SOFT TERRAIN, THE NOSE AND RIGHT MAIN LANDING GEAR COLLAPSED. AN EXAMINATION REVEALED THAT THE LEFT WING TANK QUICK DRAIN WAS INOPERABLE (RUSTED SHUT) AND WATER WAS FOUND IN THE FUEL SYSTEM. REPORTEDLY, THE QUICK DRAIN HAD BEEN INOPERATIVE SINCE THE PILOT HAD PURCHASED THE AIRCRAFT, ABOUT TWO YEARS PREVIOUSLY. THE PILOT BELIEVED WATER COULD BE DRAINED FROM THE LEFT TANK BY SELECTING THAT POSITION AND PULLING THE GASCOLATOR HANDLE IN THE COCKPIT. AN AUTHORIZED MOONEY DISTRIBUTOR STATED THAT OVER ONE GALLON OF FLUID WOULD HAVE TO BE DRAINED IN THIS MANNER, TO BE EFFECTIVE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA82DA135
- Event ID
- 20020917X04135
- Case number
- SEA82DA135
- 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: e7707861de76470bf3ec5a31df6ac8a3d25dd60011c119c13afc33cafcda635d; retrieved 2026-09-24T01:57:16.037Z.