CEN18LA138 · Piper PA 24 UNDESIGNAT
Piper PA 24 UNDESIGNAT · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) on approach
From New Braunfels National Airport (KBAZ) to New Braunfels National Airport (KBAZ)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN18LA138
- 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 PA 24 UNDESIGNAT
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-24
- 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
- N7386P
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From New Braunfels National Airport (KBAZ), New Braunfels, TXTo New Braunfels National Airport (KBAZ), New Braunfels, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 57 years (built 1961)
- 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
- Approach
- 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 from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The private pilot was preparing for his commercial checkride with a flight instructor onboard. They had completed several touch-and-go landings when the engine experienced a partial loss of power on the downwind leg of the airport traffic pattern. Attempts to restore power were unsuccessful, and the pilots selected a field for a forced landing. The airplane came to a stop after impacting a fence. A postaccident examination found that fuel was available in both wing tanks. An initial test of the fuel system found that fuel would not flow from the right wing fuel tank; however, the condition could not be replicated during a subsequent test. A test run of the engine revealed no anomalies. The fuel line pickup screen in the right wing fuel tank was clear and no foreign material was observed in the fuel tank.
The carburetor icing probability chart indicated that the airplane was operating in an area associated with a serious risk of carburetor ice accumulation at glide power settings. Despite the risk of carburetor icing, the airplane had completed several takeoffs and landings without problems and the pilots stated that they applied carburetor heat following the loss of power; therefore, it is unlikely that the loss of power was the result of carburetor ice accumulation. The reason for the loss of engine power could not be determined based on the available information.
Probable cause
A partial loss of engine power 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 CEN18LA138
- Event ID
- 20180413X00531
- Case number
- CEN18LA138
- 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: 6430227b98b5fc26d072d35a84aaf488c48499ff75289f6449c6f6b78983e09a; retrieved 2026-09-16T06:49:31.189Z.