WPR16LA045 · Piper PA18 150
Piper PA18 150 · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) while maneuvering
From Felts Field (SFF) to Felts Field (SFF)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR16LA045
- 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
Piper PA18 150
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA18
- 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
- N2684A
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Felts Field (SFF), Spokane, WATo Felts Field (SFF), Spokane, WA
- Aircraft age
- About 64 years (built 1952)
- 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
- 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
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The private pilot performed two low passes to the snow-covered airstrip, during which the airplane's flaps were extended and carburetor heat was on. After completing the second low pass, the pilot retracted the wing flaps, turned off the carburetor heat, and applied engine power to go around. The engine subsequently experienced roughness and a partial loss of power. The pilot turned the carburetor heat back on, but engine power was not restored. Unable to maintain altitude, the pilot elected to land on the airstrip he had been overflying. During the landing, the airplane nosed over due to the depth of the accumulated snow, which resulted in substantial damage.
A postaccident examination of the carburetor revealed full control continuity to the carburetor heat/air box, the butterfly valve reached full travel, and full control continuity from the cockpit throttle and mixture controls to the carburetor was confirmed. An engine run revealed no anomalies. Although the airplane was operating in conditions that were conducive to a serious risk of carburetor ice accumulation at a descent power setting, the engine was operating at a takeoff/go-around power setting at the time of the loss of power, and it is unlikely that carburetor ice would have accumulated during this time. Therefore, the reason for the partial loss of engine power could not be determined.
Probable cause
A partial loss of engine power for reasons that could not be determined because postaccident examination of the engine did not reveal any anomalies that would have precluded normal operation.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR16LA045
- Event ID
- 20160104X02458
- Case number
- WPR16LA045
- 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: aef40e11e8e249ba1a55e6defb83db345256aaf670ea0c0cac2140cab37e4160; retrieved 2026-09-16T03:03:51.544Z.