CEN11LA311 · Mooney Aircraft CORP. M20K
Mooney Aircraft CORP. M20K · Accident: loss of engine power (total) during an emergency descent
From Lakefront Airport (NEW) to Peachtree City Falcon Field (FFC)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN11LA311
- 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
Mooney Aircraft CORP. M20K
- Aircraft type
- Mooney M20
- 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
- N305M
- Operator
- John Baker
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Lakefront Airport (NEW), New Orleans, LATo Peachtree City Falcon Field (FFC), Peachtree City, GA
- 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
- Emergency descent
- 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 power plant
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Prior to departure, the pilot was unable to start the engine using the airplane electrical system. The engine was subsequently started with the assistance of a ground power unit; however, the pilot could not get the cockpit lights to work. The battery was charged and the engine was again started with the assistance of a ground power unit. The electrical system appeared to be operating normally and the pilot departed. During initial climb after takeoff, the pilot noticed an overvoltage indication. He informed an air traffic controller and during the return to the departure airport, the avionics began to flicker and the electrical system failed completely. During the approach, the airplane experienced a loss of engine power as the pilot was attempting to manually lower the landing gear. He was unable to reach the airport and subsequently landed in an adjacent lake. The airplane was recovered from the lake about 3 weeks after the accident. A postrecovery examination of the electrical system did not reveal any anomalies consistent with a loss of electrical power. Additionally, no reason for a complete loss of engine power was determined. Operation of the engine ignition system is completely independent of the airplane electrical system.
Probable cause
A loss of electrical and engine power for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN11LA311
- Event ID
- 20110429X24751
- Case number
- CEN11LA311
- 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, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2011-04-07.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 739aa8e79314a57a3eb4756c50f305f554e53df12bf08c4154f7d6712fb8cc3b; retrieved 2026-09-15T16:06:40.312Z.