DEN06LA063 · Rumble/Williams/Boomhower Starduster II
Rumble/Williams/Boomhower Starduster II · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Freeman Field (3JC) to Prairie Cottage Airport (8KS8)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN06LA063
- 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
Rumble/Williams/Boomhower Starduster II
- Aircraft type
- Rumble/williams/boomhower STARDUSTER
- 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
- N7JC
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Freeman Field (3JC), Junction City, KSTo Prairie Cottage Airport (8KS8), Chapman, KS
- 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)
- 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, line › Vapor lock
- Pilot in command › Aircraft control, abrupt
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 reported making a normal takeoff and climb out. At about 200 feet above the ground, the pilot said the engine lost power without any prior warning. The pilot immediately executed a forced landing. On touchdown, the pilot applied "hard brakes" to avoid a ravine at the end of the grass strip. The airplane subsequently nosed over on its back causing substantial damage to the top wing, vertical stabilizer, and rudder. An examination of the engine showed that the fuel lines had been routed within 1-1/4 inches of the dual exhaust pipes. FAA requirements for certified airplanes requires a minimum of 6 inches separation due to the potential for fuel in the lines to boil and subsequently cause a vapor lock in the lines. No other anomalies were found.
Probable cause
Vapor lock which resulted in total engine failure and the pilot's abrupt brake application on touchdown. Factors contributing to the accident were the improper design of the fuel system resulting in the misrouting of the fuel lines close to the exhaust pipes, and the short landing area.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN06LA063
- Event ID
- 20060417X00448
- Case number
- DEN06LA063
- 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 2006-04-14.
- API snapshot SHA-256: b199a6525bcb30fd967eae2f166fb936372c4ba7321772287c37d1a7463cb877; retrieved 2026-09-22T04:59:50.063Z.