DEN04LA055 · Mikoyan MiG Mig-17
Mikoyan MiG Mig-17 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure en route
From Roswell Air Center Airport (ROW) to Phoenix Deer Valley Airport (DVT)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN04LA055
- 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
- 1 · 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
Mikoyan MiG Mig-17
- Aircraft type
- Mikoyan Mig MIG-17
- 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
- N508M
- Operator
- George L. Cambron · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Roswell Air Center Airport (ROW), Roswell, NMTo Phoenix Deer Valley Airport (DVT), Phoenix, AZ
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
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 checked in with the air traffic control center and was cleared to Flight Level 350. Approximately 28 minutes into the flight the pilot told the center that his right underwing fuel tank was not transferring fuel and that he needed to declare an emergency. The controller asked the pilot where he wanted to proceed. the pilot responded with his intended destination. Two minutes later, radar contact with the airplane was lost. Shortly following the loss of radar contact, the center began tracking several targets that fanned out to the northwest and east of the airplane's last recorded position. The airplane wreckage was discovered 2 days later in a crater approximately 3.5 nautical miles northwest of the last radar return. An examination of recovered components showed that the two underwing fuel tanks separated from the airplane prior to its impact with the ground. The examination also showed that components associated with the airplane's cockpit area were subjected to a fire of short duration and low temperature. No other anomalies were found.
Probable cause
the loss of aircraft control for undetermined reasons resulting in impact with desert terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN04LA055
- Event ID
- 20040402X00416
- Case number
- DEN04LA055
- 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: bf210a969ad5cd7eb4be973bf1f988f3b2f3062594c80fa6c9251f56e522c807; retrieved 2026-09-20T18:31:07.895Z.