ERA14LA281 · Belew Marshall D II STEEN SKYBOLT
Belew Marshall D II STEEN SKYBOLT · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) during initial climb
From Whifferdill Airport (TN77) to Whifferdill Airport (TN77)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA14LA281
- 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
Belew Marshall D II STEEN SKYBOLT
- Aircraft type
- Belew Marshall D Ii STEEN SKYBOLT
- 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
- N863SB
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Whifferdill Airport (TN77), Chapmansboro, TNTo Whifferdill Airport (TN77), Chapmansboro, TN
- Aircraft age
- About 14 years (built 2000)
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he performed a preflight inspection with no anomalies noted. In addition, he performed an engine run-up, and everything was normal. During the initial climb, about 200 ft above ground level and just over the departure end of the runway, the pilot noticed that the airplane was not producing full power; witnesses corroborated that the engine lost partial power after the airplane reached the end of the runway. The pilot chose to return to the runway and performed a 180-degree turn. Once the airplane was over the runway centerline, the pilot attempted to add power; however, the engine did not respond. Witnesses reported that, as the airplane neared the runway, the pilot "flared too high" and that the airplane then "stalled," descended, and impacted the runway. A postimpact fire ensued. A postaccident examination of the engine revealed no evidence of mechanical failures or malfunctions that would have precluded normal operation. The reason for the partial loss of engine power could not be determined.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain airspeed while performing an emergency landing, which led to the airplane exceeding its critical angle-of-attack and experiencing a subsequent aerodynamic stall. Contributing to the accident was a partial loss of engine power for reasons that could not be determined during postaccident examinations.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA14LA281
- Event ID
- 20140609X85154
- Case number
- ERA14LA281
- 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: 98769b6334602d9f1abd9dd55457f9f6042b5cb13d0451e06976bf4ce2d85bb9; retrieved 2026-09-15T23:46:46.765Z.