WPR09LA153 · Howes RV-6
Howes RV-6 · Accident: loss of engine power (total) en route
From Sedona Airport (SEZ) to Big Springs Ranch Airport (AZ27)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR09LA153
- 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
- 1 · 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
Howes RV-6
- Aircraft type
- Howes RV-6
- 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
- N6383W
- Operator
- Curtis L Jarvis · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sedona Airport (SEZ), Sedona, AZTo Big Springs Ranch Airport (AZ27), Paulden, AZ
- 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 · cruise
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
A witness observed the accident airplane performing turns to the left and right and trailing white smoke. The witness stated that the airplane was about "tree-top level" when it pitched down and impacted the ground. Examination by a Federal Aviation Administration inspector revealed oil along the bottom side of the fuselage and on the tailwheel. A friend of the pilot, who was also an aircraft mechanic, reported that prior to the accident flight he and the pilot found an oil leak originating from a stainless steel high-pressure oil line from the propeller governor to the forward area of the engine crankcase. The mechanic stated that he had removed the oil line and the pilot had it repaired by a local weld shop. After reinstallation of the oil line, the mechanic conducted an engine run and did not observe any oil leaks originating from the oil line. The pilot then decided to fly the airplane around the area on a test flight. According to the mechanic, as the airplane departed the runway, he observed a trail of white smoke originating from the airplane. Despite two requests by the mechanic to return to the airport, the pilot stated that "everything was fine" and he was going to continue to a nearby airport. No further radio communication was received from the pilot. Examination of the engine revealed that the stainless steel high pressure oil line from the propeller governor was in place. The oil line exhibited a repair weld on the forward area of the line, and corresponding wear marks were observed on the engine crankcase. The oil line was removed and the forward end of the oil line was capped off using a bolt. The area of the weld was placed under water and compressed air pressure was applied to the opposite end of the oil line. A leak was observed originating from the area of the weld. Partial disassembly of the engine revealed that the number two connecting rod was separated from the crankshaft and exhibited signatures consistent with oil starvation.
Probable cause
A total loss of engine power due to oil starvation as a result of a leak from the inadequate weld repair of a high-pressure oil line. Also causal was the pilot's failure to maintain adequate airspeed while maneuvering that resulted in a stall during an attempted off-field landing and the pilot's decision to continue flight with a known discrepancy.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR09LA153
- Event ID
- 20090319X04253
- Case number
- WPR09LA153
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2009-03-19.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 3bb46811f50081f3e41a55d00ac6061b74d4d94b8758c24f7d2f61022921fb34; retrieved 2026-09-13T20:00:04.598Z.