ERA15LA134 · Cirrus Design Corp SR22
Optimal Aircraft Management Cirrus Design Corp SR22 · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) during takeoff
From Blue Grass Airport (LEX) to Oakland County International Airport (PTK)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA15LA134
- 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
Cirrus Design Corp SR22
- Aircraft type
- Cirrus SR22
- 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
- N358CD
- Operator
- Optimal Aircraft Management
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Blue Grass Airport (LEX), Lexington, KYTo Oakland County International Airport (PTK), Pontiac, MI
- Aircraft age
- About 11 years (built 2004)
- 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
- Takeoff
- 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)
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Tree(s)
- 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 handling/service
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The private pilot reported that he conducted a preflight inspection and engine-run-up with no anomalies noted. The pilot then taxied the airplane to the runway and began the takeoff roll for his planned personal cross-country flight. The airplane lifted off the runway and climbed to about 200 ft above ground level, at which point, the engine "backfired" several times, followed by a partial loss of power. The pilot chose to discontinue the flight, retarded the throttle to idle, and initiated a descent to land on the remaining runway; however, the pilot was unable to stop the airplane, and it overran the runway and collided with the precision approach path indicator lights and a snowbank.
Postaccident test runs of the engine with a new set of magnetos and the original ignition harness revealed that the likely cause of the loss of engine power was related to the ignition harness. Subsequent examination of the ignition harness revealed the presence of radial carbon tracks on the sleeves of 8 of the 12 terminals on the harness. The harness and its terminal wells were in generally dirty condition, which likely resulted in spark plugs erratically misfiring. Although one of the engine's magnetos internal mechanisms was damaged, the damage was likely the result of the engine misfiring.
According to an engine manufacturer service bulletin (SB), the ignition harness spark plug terminals should be removed, inspected, and cleaned at each annual inspection. The engine logbook indicated that the spark plugs were "cleaned, gapped, and inspected" during the last annual inspection, which was completed about 14 flight hours before the accident. However, the logbooks did not note compliance with the SB or whether the ignition harness spark plug terminal, and not just the spark plugs, had been inspected and/or cleaned. Given the generally dirty condition of the ignition harness spark plug terminals, it is likely that maintenance personnel did not properly inspect and clean the ignition harness terminals in accordance with the SB.
Probable cause
Maintenance personnel's failure to properly inspect and clean the engine ignition harness spark plug terminals, which resulted in a partial loss of engine power during an attempted takeoff.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA15LA134
- Event ID
- 20150224X94231
- Case number
- ERA15LA134
- 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: 198e732618544f3b7b9b91b36e7368099a857aeb159a1521c9a74e1925ac9f07; retrieved 2026-09-16T02:06:26.551Z.