LAX04LA032 · Beech 95-B55
Beech 95-B55 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From P32 · Williams, AZ to P32
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX04LA032
- 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
Beech 95-B55
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 55
- 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
- N8322N
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From P32 · Williams, AZTo P32
- 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 exhaustion; 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, fuel › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Directional control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Propeller feathering, not performed
- Pilot in command › Refueling, not 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 airplane lost power in the right engine about 150 feet above ground level in the takeoff initial climb, veered to the right, and impacted trees and terrain. The pilot was in the process of buying the airplane and conducted a preflight inspection. During the preflight, he noted that the fuel appeared to be low and commented on the low fuel state to the owner. According to the pilot, the owner replied that there was enough fuel on board for several flights around the pattern. The pilot did not add any fuel to the tanks. The pilot told Federal Aviation Administration inspectors that he did not attempt to feather the right engine's propeller after the loss of power. The pilot recalled not smelling any fuel around the airplane after the accident. First responders to the accident site reported no leaking fuel, and no odor of fuel around the airplane. Aircraft recovery personnel drained a total of 2 gallons of fuel from the airplane. A visual inspection and continuity check were conducted on the right engine. No preimpact anomalies were noted that would have precluded the right engine from producing power.
Probable cause
a loss of engine power in the right engine due to fuel exhaustion, caused by the pilot's inadequate preflight inspection and failure to refuel the airplane. Also causal was his failure to feather the right propeller and to maintain directional control of the airplane.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX04LA032
- Event ID
- 20031112X01885
- Case number
- LAX04LA032
- 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: 88994d7b3787916af7acba12b63cca0e9b2eedebfb87e3febce7ded5a8d6c3db; retrieved 2026-09-21T09:21:21.310Z.