WPR14CA013 · Piper PA 28-180
Piper PA 28-180 · Accident: controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT) during an emergency descent
From Yellowstone Regional Airport (COD) to Mccarley Field (U02)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR14CA013
- 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
Piper PA 28-180
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N31BA
- Operator
- Betzold James e
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Yellowstone Regional Airport (COD), Cody, WYTo Mccarley Field (U02), Blackfoot, ID
- Aircraft age
- About 48 years (built 1965)
- 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
- Controlled flight into terrain/object (CFIT)
- 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
- 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
The pilot reported that about 15 minutes after departure and during the climb to cruise altitude, the engine lost power. The pilot checked the cockpit gauges and switched fuel tanks, however the engine would not restart. A forced landing was initiated and during the descent in mountainous terrain, the airplane collided with trees and the terrain.
The wreckage has not been recovered and the reason for the loss of engine power was not determined.
Probable cause
A loss of engine power during climb to cruise for reasons that could not be determined due to no postaccident examination.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR14CA013
- Event ID
- 20131016X30057
- Case number
- WPR14CA013
- 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: 0486ef2113f6ab3efa5cbae0521af405993f6e4ef10bcf998dc68eced5f12991; retrieved 2026-09-15T22:57:05.968Z.