ATL04LA187 · Piper PA-22-108
Piper PA-22-108 · Accident: loss of engine power during initial climb
From KX40 · Inverness, FL to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL04LA187
- 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
Piper PA-22-108
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-22
- 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
- N4647Z
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From KX40 · Inverness, 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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
- 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
- Fuel system, carburetor › Loose part/bolt/nut/clamp/etc
- Unknown › Maintenance, installation, improper
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
During climbout about 300 feet above the ground, the airplane's engine lost power down to 2000 rpm. The student pilot reported it audibly "lost a cylinder." He stated the EGT showed very hot on the No. 3 cylinder. He stated he verified the mixture was at full rich, and he reduced throttle a little, but the EGT did not improve. He stated he returned to full throttle and almost immediately the "engine stopped hard" within two seconds, and the airframe shook heavily. He glided the airplane toward a road, and the airplane collided with trees and the ground. Examination of the engine revealed compression developed on all four cylinders when the crankshaft was rotated at the propeller flange. Valve train continuity was observed, and both magnetos produced spark on all towers. The air intake box displayed crush damage. The lower engine cowling was removed, and the carburetor was found separated from the intake manifold. The manifold mount studs displayed chafing, one manifold mount stud was bent. One mounting nut and two flat washers were found in the cowling, and the other mounting nuts were not located.
Probable cause
The improper installation of the carburetor which resulted in a loss of engine power and subsequent collision with trees during an emergency landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL04LA187
- Event ID
- 20040921X01469
- Case number
- ATL04LA187
- 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: 1ba4d942924e549dfd1f75d9ab87cf0b47e9b23e92bf4289425aa67172d56eaf; retrieved 2026-09-22T06:43:06.683Z.