WPR14LA079 · Stinson 108 1
Stinson 108 1 · Accident: powerplant system/component malfunction/failure en route
From Kingdon Airpark (O20) to Modesto City Co-Harry Sham Field (MOD)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR14LA079
- 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
Stinson 108 1
- Aircraft type
- Stinson 108
- 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
- N8848K
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Kingdon Airpark (O20), Lodi, CATo Modesto City Co-Harry Sham Field (MOD), Modesto, CA
- Aircraft age
- About 66 years (built 1947)
- 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 · climb to 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
- Powerplant system/component malfunction/failure
- 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 as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that, shortly after takeoff, the engine began to sputter and that it eventually lost all power. The pilot was unable to return to the airport and initiated a forced landing to an open field. During the landing, the airplane struck a berm, nosed over, and then came to rest inverted.
A postaccident examination of the engine revealed that the crankshaft and camshaft had broken adjacent to the accessory section. A metallurgical examination of the crankshaft fracture surfaces revealed a thumbnail-shaped pattern consistent with fatigue that had initiated at the crankshaft surface near the edge of the No. 2 connecting rod journal. It is possible that the fatigue initiated due to the No. 2 connecting rod bearing shifting during operation. The camshaft fracture features were consistent with overstress. Maintenance records indicated that the last annual inspection was completed about 9 months before the accident and that, at that time, the engine had accumulated about 250 hours since major overhaul.
Probable cause
The fatigue failure of the crankshaft, which resulted in a total loss of engine power and subsequent forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR14LA079
- Event ID
- 20131227X71823
- Case number
- WPR14LA079
- 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: a271649b7fec9a6bc57ac5b6dcf0ea4f3967edbaa42fb3b700029758b0a5163d; retrieved 2026-09-15T23:12:51.010Z.