NYC06LA045 · Beech 23
Beech 23 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From Quonset State Airport (OQU) to Windham Airport (IJD)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC06LA045
- 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 23
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 23
- 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
- N7631R
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Quonset State Airport (OQU), North Kingstown, RITo Windham Airport (IJD), Willimantic, CT
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern final
- 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)
- 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
- Weather condition › Carburetor icing conditions
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 stated that while on approach to Windham Airport, the engine began to run roughly, then completely lost power. He switched fuel tanks, and attempted an engine restart, but was unsuccessful. The pilot then maneuvered the airplane toward a snow-covered field, but could not clear trees during the final approach. After the accident, evidence of fuel was found at the scene. Fuel was plumbed to the engine through the left fuel tank, and the engine was started, and ran continuously on the airframe without interruption. The temperature was 19 degrees Fahrenheit and the dew point was 13 degrees Fahrenheit. Interpolation of a carburetor icing probability chart revealed that atmospheric conditions were conducive to "icing at glide or cruise power." The pilot reported that there were no mechanical deficiencies with the airplane, and stated, " I have reason to believe that carburetor ice was the problem, although I was using carburetor heat at the time."
Probable cause
A complete loss of engine power due to carburetor ice. A contributing factor was the lack of suitable terrain for the emergency landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC06LA045
- Event ID
- 20051228X02021
- Case number
- NYC06LA045
- 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: 68ec1201e43ab89adcb3e86b0fa7482663915c736ebfea2a75e6897216f14f6e; retrieved 2026-09-21T09:01:13.930Z.