WPR09LA205 · Cessna 152
Orion Aviation Cessna 152 · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) on approach
From McClellan-Palomar Airport (CRQ) to McClellan-Palomar Airport (CRQ)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR09LA205
- 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
Cessna 152
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 152
- 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
- N48259
- Operator
- Orion Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From McClellan-Palomar Airport (CRQ), Carlsbad, CATo McClellan-Palomar Airport (CRQ), Carlsbad, 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
- 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 (partial)
- 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 power plant
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, not marked as estimated; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he had been practicing touch-and-go takeoffs and landings for about an hour. On the accident takeoff, he noted a rough running engine. The airplane had already attained traffic pattern altitude, therefore the pilot continued the flight and declared an emergency on downwind. The pilot stated that he trimmed the airplane for best glide, and as he turned onto final approach, there was a further reduction in engine rpm and an increase in engine roughness. Unable to reach the runway, the airplane landed on its nose short of the runway threshold. Both the wings and fuselage were substantially damaged. An inspection of the engine revealed that the bottom spark plug of the number 2 cylinder was carbon fouled, which could have resulted in a partial loss of engine rpm and a rough running engine. No other mechanical anomalies were noted with the engine inspection.
Probable cause
A partial loss of engine power during takeoff due to carbon fouling of a spark plug.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR09LA205
- Event ID
- 20090420X01533
- Case number
- WPR09LA205
- 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: 7c28f2107c6be3dd1ec3920e43bfef9d640c6fc52e29c52f27a8027dcacc9f2d; retrieved 2026-09-15T10:57:21.853Z.