SEA07CA099 · Barnett MA-5 Charger
Barnett MA-5 Charger · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From Reid-Hillview Airport of Santa Clara County (KRHV) to San Martin Airport (E16)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA07CA099
- 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
Barnett MA-5 Charger
- Aircraft type
- Barnett MA-5
- 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
- N20HD
- Operator
- James B. Dal Porto · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Reid-Hillview Airport of Santa Clara County (KRHV), San Jose, CATo San Martin Airport (E16), San Martin, CA
- 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 base
- 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 as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he entered the pattern on left base for landing. During the turn from base to final approach, the aircraft was low so the pilot added power, however, the engine did not respond. The pilot realized that he would not make the runway and chose an open field for an off airport landing. During the landing roll, the pilot intentionally ground looped the aircraft to avoid a collision with a fence. The aircraft sustained substantial damage to the right landing gear attach fitting and longeron as well as the right wing tip. After the aircraft was recovered from the field and taken to the airport, the engine was started and found to run without anomaly on the main fuel tank. The pilot reported that after the accident he pulled up the weather current at the time of the accident and compared it to the probable carburetor icing chart, he noted that the temperature and dew point fell into the range of serious icing at glide power. The nearest weather reporting facility indicated a temperature of 70 degrees F. and a dew point of 55 degrees F.
Probable cause
Carburetor icing conditions which resulted in a loss of engine power during the base turn to final approach. The pilot's inadequate preflight planning/preparation for the flight was a factor.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA07CA099
- Event ID
- 20070427X00469
- Case number
- SEA07CA099
- 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. 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: 144e324aaa666dea6b45b52d941e33a16d58de587fba5e69f6700c4cccaa52fb; retrieved 2026-09-22T03:55:23.045Z.