MIA08LA041 · Grumman American AA-5B
Grumman American AA-5B · Accident: loss of engine power (total) during initial climb
From Norwood Memorial Airport (KOWD) to Linden Airport (LDJ)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA08LA041
- 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
Grumman American AA-5B
- Aircraft type
- Grumman American AA-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
- N414DJ
- Operator
- Douglas James Weir
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Norwood Memorial Airport (KOWD), Norwood, MATo Linden Airport (LDJ), Linden, NJ
- 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
- Defining eventThe 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 (total)
- 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
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
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 pilot, after normal preflight and engine run-up, he departed runway 17 and noted that the engine was developing 2250 revolutions per minute. Initial climb out was normal, but after reaching about 200 feet above ground level the engine suddenly sputtered and lost power. He declared an emergency, and with little runway left to land straight ahead, he maneuvered the airplane to look for an alternative landing site. He stated that the airplane was just above stall speed when he landed in soft wetlands adjacent to the runway. Examination of the airplane by an FAA Inspector found the fuel tanks full, with no contamination. The throttle, mixture, carburetor heat controls, and flight controls functioned normally. Engine continuity was established through to the accessory section when the propeller was rotated by hand. Additionally, at the time of takeoff, the air temperature was 31 degrees Fahrenheit, dew point temperature 23 degrees Fahrenheit, and humidity was 67 percent. According to the FAA's Icing Probability Curve, at the above temperature, dew point and humidity, the icing curve indicates visible icing at rated power for float type carburetors.
Probable cause
The loss of engine power for undetermined reasons.
*This report was modified on May 20, 2008.*
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA08LA041
- Event ID
- 20080123X00091
- Case number
- MIA08LA041
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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: f5eee9af85bf9c5c2fea3e10c653e7e8d79cb02f9386a6e7ffafe0482fe93a60; retrieved 2026-09-15T09:20:50.975Z.