NYC03LA200 · Lake LA-4-200
Lake LA-4-200 · Accident: overrun during takeoff
From Mayers Airport (VG24) to Mayers Airport (VG24)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC03LA200
- 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
Lake LA-4-200
- Aircraft type
- Lake LA-4
- 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
- N32DQ
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Mayers Airport (VG24), AshlandTo Mayers Airport (VG24)
- 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
- Takeoff · rejected takeoff
- 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
- Overrun
- 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 › Aborted takeoff, performed
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 was departing from a 2,000 feet long, turf runway. He reported that after becoming airborne, the engine or prop sound changed, and then he perceived that the airplane was slowing and settling. He aborted the takeoff, and touched down on the runway. The pilot was unable to stop before the end, and overran the runway. The airplane then crossed a road where the nose wheel separated from the fuselage, and came to rest in a pond. The engine was test run by the FAA at takeoff power for 5 minutes with no variation in rpm noted. When the propeller control was placed in the cruise power range, 2,200 to 2,300, the propeller tended to hunt, plus or minus 50 rpm. The manufacturer of the propeller governor tested the unit and reported that the rpm was set higher than specified. When disassemble, the unit was found worn, with sludge and some small particles trapped inside the gasket screen.
Probable cause
The pilot's decision to perform an aborted takeoff after he perceived a power loss. A factor was the unsuitable terrain the airplane encountered after it overran the end of the runway.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC03LA200
- Event ID
- 20031017X01758
- Case number
- NYC03LA200
- 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: 22ad382094b56d263ab1e952b5043182262c62bec312d936151b40b84fc4640f; retrieved 2026-09-22T08:32:14.737Z.