ANC05LA006 · Piper J-3
Piper J-3 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From North Pole, AK to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC05LA006
- 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 J-3
- Aircraft type
- Piper J-3
- 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
- N92469
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From North Pole, AKTo 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
- 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
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, 100-hour inspection, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The commercial certificated flight instructor was giving flight instruction for a tailwheel endorsement to the commercial certificated airplane owner. Shortly after takeoff from the private airstrip, the airplane lost all engine power. The flight instructor assumed control of the airplane, and made a forced landing into adjacent trees. The airplane received structural damage to both wings and the rudder. Postaccident inspection of the airplane by an FAA airworthiness inspector disclosed that the airplane had completed an annual inspection about 9 flight hours prior to the accident flight. The inspector discovered that an incorrect size carburetor had been installed by the mechanic who did the annual inspection, and that the center fuel tank had corrosion and rust contamination, and was missing its outlet fuel screen. The inspector disassembled the fuel gascolator screen, and discovered it was clogged with foreign debris. After the gascolator was cleaned, the inspector reported that "the engine started and ran fine."
Probable cause
An inadequate annual inspection by other maintenance personnel, which resulted in a loss of engine power during takeoff-initial climb, and subsequent collision with trees during the ensuing emergency landing. Factors associated with the accident are a contaminated fuel system, a missing fuel screen, and a clogged fuel gascolator.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC05LA006
- Event ID
- 20041021X01671
- Case number
- ANC05LA006
- 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: local date, investigation status, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2004-10-14.
- API snapshot SHA-256: da680767078b32b00e4b616d4398017009470c221918c2af04734f4f33a3c0a2; retrieved 2026-09-22T06:37:06.716Z.