ATL06LA060 · Just Aircraft LLC Highlander
Just Aircraft LLC Highlander · Accident: partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure) during initial climb
From Walhalla, SC to Walhalla, SC
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL06LA060
- 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
Just Aircraft LLC Highlander
- Aircraft type
- Just HIGHLANDER
- 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
- N9085N
- Operator
- Gary W Schmitt · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Walhalla, SCTo Walhalla, SC
- 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
- Partial loss of engine power (mechanical failure)
- 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 starvation; 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
- Company maintenance personnel › Maintenance, inspection, improper
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the builder/owner of the airplane, the airplane was certified as a Light Sport Airplane (LSA) on March 28, 2006, and was being prepared for an air show in Florida. During the preparation of the airplane, the builder/owner stated that they noticed that a vacuum hose was loose. They repaired the hose and the pilot flew the airplane around for an hour, and everything checked out "ok". The builder/owner stated that on the morning of the accident the pilot flew the airplane around again to check to make sure they had good "temperatures". The pilot took off again and after climbing to approximately 100 feet AGL the engine began to sputter in and out. He landed the airplane and shut the engine down. The builder/owner stated that when the pilot started up the airplane again he conducted 2 run-ups before take off. Both run-ups sounded good. The pilot took off again and the engine again began to sputter during the climb out. A witness who was located across the lake from the airstrip heard the engine sputtering as he observed the airplane above the tree line adjacent to the lake. The airplane made a hard left turn but was "still on a level plain". The airplane went below the tree line and disappeared from view. The witness heard "the engine race one last time before the sound of impact." Examination of the fuel pumps revealed that both pumps had a fine mesh screens on the inlet side of the pumps. The screens were found to have excessive debris build up. Examination of the debris revealed it appeared to be fiberglass fibers, and the fibers were consistent with the fuel tank construction materials.
Probable cause
The pilot and owner/builders failure to determine the reason for partial loss of engine power resulting in loss of engine power due to fuel system contamination on a subsequent flight.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL06LA060
- Event ID
- 20060406X00404
- Case number
- ATL06LA060
- 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: e0c554b9dc24c2ccab21af8a87d2074f8ebdc23b569b1c77d6e4ef23414303d8; retrieved 2026-09-21T08:59:18.602Z.