ANC04FA042 · Cessna 150C
Cessna 150C · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From 1J6 · Bob Lee FS, FL to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC04FA042
- 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
- 2 · 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 150C
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 150
- 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
- N2080Z
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 1J6 · Bob Lee FS, FLTo not recorded
- 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 contamination; 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
- Fluid, fuel › Contamination, water
- Pilot in command › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, not maintained
- Unqualified person › Stall/spin, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The unqualified pilot departed on a VFR local personal flight with one passenger. Witnesses reported a normal takeoff, but during the initial climb, they indicated the engine started running rough, and the airplane started a right turn toward the airport. The witnesses said the engine then quit completely, the airplane banked sharply to the left, and descended straight down, impacting the ground about 1/8 of a mile from the airstrip. The two occupants of the airplane were fatally injured, and the airplane was destroyed by impact and postcrash fire. The owner of the airplane, who is a certified aviation mechanic with inspector authorization, said the pilot was a friend who flew the airplane several days a week. He said the pilot fueled the airplane with auto gas prior to the flight, and that there were no known mechanical anomalies with the airplane he was aware of. The accident site was a level cultivated field. The airplane impacted the ground in an approximate 60 degree pitch down, and 30 degrees right wing low attitude. The gascolator was heat damaged, but remained intact. Upon opening the gascolator, about 1/2 ounce of water was found inside the glass bowl. The engine was examined, and no preaccident mechanical anomalies were found. The unqualified pilot did not possess an FAA airman certificate, and no record of any flight time or flight training was discovered during the investigation.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to detect water in the fuel system during the preflight inspection, which precipitated a loss of engine power during initial climb, and his failure to maintain adequate airspeed resulting in a stall.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC04FA042
- Event ID
- 20040325X00372
- Case number
- ANC04FA042
- 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: c78193ee6ed31e3535466ae52d7123bde99c17c0b4848e264a12e21d4b4cff57; retrieved 2026-09-20T18:31:21.817Z.