DFW06LA199 · Piper PA-28-161
Piper PA-28-161 · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Houston Southwest Airport (AXH) to Houston, TX
Event
- NTSB case
- DFW06LA199
- 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-28-161
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N82078
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Houston Southwest Airport (AXH), Houston, TXTo Houston, TX
- 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
- En route · climb to cruise
- 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
- 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
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The 600-hour private pilot and 3 passengers could not get the airplane to start due to a "malfunction of the starter". A mechanic was called and the mechanic removed the "skin" around the engine and "sprayed a large amount of varsol and silicone into the starter." The engine starter then worked. After the work was completed, the pilot performed a "run-up and preflight inspection [and] all seemed okay." The pilot added that during the takeoff initial climb, while at about 300 feet MSL the engine totally failed." Fuel was found at the accident site and rescue personnel reported that the fuel selector was in the left-tank position, but they turned it to the "off" position after the crash. The engine was removed from the airplane's airframe, and placed on an engine test run stand. The test stand's electric fuel pump was used to prime the engine, and the engine started. Because the propeller was bent, a vibration developed and the engine could not be run above idle rpm. The engine was shutdown, the accident airplane's propeller was removed and replaced with a test propeller. The engine was then restarted and ran for approximately 15 minutes at various (idle to full) power settings. During initial startup and subsequent run, the engine's fuel pressure (engine driven pump) varied from about 2-3 psi, and then moved to about 5 psi and stabilized. The airplane's electric fuel pump was removed from the airplane, and connected to a battery source and appear to operate fine. However, operation of the electric fuel pump could not be verified, during the takeoff. The fuel lines from the wings to the engine were checked, and were clear of any obstructions. The engine drive fuel pump was removed from the engine and disassembled. A small piece of debris (approximately 1/8 inch square) was found inside the pump between the inlet and outlet chambers of the pump. The scat tubing that runs from the airbox to the carburetor was inspected. The internal wire and tubing appeared in good shape; however, the tubing had been crushed during the accident. The reason for the reported loss of engine power could not be determined.
Probable cause
The loss of engine power for undetermined reasons. A contributing factor was the lack of suitable terrain for the forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DFW06LA199
- Event ID
- 20060828X01249
- Case number
- DFW06LA199
- 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: d45207dad518595e85bb6f98b3823b86d34df8805b954a00276ac412c0b96c46; retrieved 2026-09-21T08:54:15.318Z.