CEN15FA214 · Beech B35
Beech B35 · Accident: loss of engine power (total) during initial climb
From Orange County Airport (KORG) to Orange County Airport (KORG)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN15FA214
- 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
Beech B35
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 35
- 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
- N5176C
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Orange County Airport (KORG), Orange, TXTo Orange County Airport (KORG), Orange, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 65 years (built 1950)
- 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 (total)
- 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
- Wire
- 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
- Environmental issues › Physical environment
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, not marked as estimated; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Shortly after the private pilot and flight instructor took off on a local training flight several witnesses reported seeing the airplane's wings rocking back and forth just before the airplane struck power lines and then terrain. None of these witnesses reported hearing a loss of engine power. Neither of the pilots recalled the events leading up to the accident or the accident itself.
Witness marks on the airplane and propeller were consistent with an impact with power lines. Signatures on the propeller were consistent with little to no engine power at the time of the impact with the power lines; however, investigators were unable to determine if the pilot reduced engine power, or if the engine lost power, before impact. An examination of the airframe and engine revealed no preimpact anomalies that would have precluded normal operation.
The airplane was determined to be 100 lbs over gross weight (about 2,751 lbs) at the time of takeoff. Calculations using the airplane's performance charts and the weather conditions that existed at the time of the accident indicated that the airplane had sufficient runway available to clear a 50-ft obstacle at a gross weight of 2,600 pounds. It is unknown how significantly the airplane's overweight condition would have impacted the airplane's climb performance.
Probable cause
The impact with power lines for reasons that could not be determined based on the available information.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN15FA214
- Event ID
- 20150504X25436
- Case number
- CEN15FA214
- 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: 01a74dde9638bb83980cf60dc0f32f384be6ab8922e3ef526d000b87b75b82b4; retrieved 2026-09-16T02:16:48.086Z.