ERA10LA373 · Nadig Paul K NADIG
Nadig Paul K NADIG · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) during initial climb
From Venango Regional Airport (FKL) to Venango Regional Airport (FKL)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA10LA373
- 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
- 2 · 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
Nadig Paul K NADIG
- Aircraft type
- Nadig Paul NADIG
- 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
- N579PN
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Venango Regional Airport (FKL), Franklin, PATo Venango Regional Airport (FKL), Franklin, PA
- 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 (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 systems
- Aircraft › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Witnesses observed the accident airplane in a left-hand traffic pattern over the airport performing takeoffs and landings. As the pilot was performing the third landing and takeoff, witnesses heard the engine surge before hearing the sound of an impact. The airplane collided with trees before impacting the ground about ¾ mile from the departure end of the runway. Postaccident examination of the wreckage did not reveal any evidence of preimpact malfunction with the airframe or engine controls. The engine examination revealed a blocked carburetor jet and excessive contamination of foreign material in both carburetor float bowls, indicating poor carburetor and fuel system maintenance. Once the blockage was removed from the idle jet the engine started and ran normally. The owner recently purchased the experimental, amateur-built, airplane which had an engine that used automobile fuel.
Probable cause
A partial loss of engine power due to the owner’s inadequate fuel system maintenance, which resulted in a collision with trees and subsequent impact with the ground.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA10LA373
- Event ID
- 20100725X21127
- Case number
- ERA10LA373
- 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. 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: 767c58babf690f64f0c201db39fc6f96b14dd6692bbdcd6a0522a905c34a66d4; retrieved 2026-09-13T20:57:51.666Z.