ANC15FA066 · Cessna 180
Cessna 180 · Accident: powerplant system/component malfunction/failure while maneuvering
From Kasilof Airport (5KS) to Kasilof Airport (5KS)
Event
- NTSB case
- ANC15FA066
- 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
- 2 · 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
Cessna 180
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 180
- 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
- N3043E
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Kasilof Airport (5KS), Kasilof, AKTo Kasilof Airport (5KS), Kasilof, AK
- Aircraft age
- About 61 years (built 1954)
- 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
- Maneuvering · low-altitude flying
- 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
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
A witness stated that he saw the accident airplane operating at a low level over the beach. When the airplane was directly in front of him, it pitched up to about 45 degrees and climbed to about 100 ft above the trees located on the bluff overlooking the water. After lowering the nose to a level pitch attitude, he heard a reduction in engine power followed by a sound consistent with an engine misfiring. The airplane disappeared from view, and the engine noise ceased. Immediately after, a loud sound consistent with an impact was heard and a postimpact fire consumed the wreckage.
Based on the witness statement, in combination with the absence of power signatures on the propeller in the wreckage, it is likely the engine was not producing rated power at the time of the accident.
A NTSB postaccident examination of the airframe and engine revealed no mechanical malfunctions or anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. An engine test run was conducted following the replacement of impact- and thermal-damaged components. The engine experienced a normal start and accelerated normally without any hesitation, stumbling, or interruption in power, and demonstrated the ability to produce rated horsepower.
Probable cause
The total loss of engine power for reasons that could not be determined based on postaccident examination and testing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ANC15FA066
- Event ID
- 20150824X42658
- Case number
- ANC15FA066
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2015-08-23.
- API snapshot SHA-256: e7ac2618c460a139e4f892c91e1fe8958d9c1f2dd56922c76c4d7a092805e6c3; retrieved 2026-09-14T21:29:10.187Z.