ERA19LA282 · Cessna 337 G
Cessna 337 G · Accident during takeoff
From Northeast Florida Regional Airport (SGJ) to Northeast Florida Regional Airport (SGJ)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA19LA282
- 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
Cessna 337 G
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 337
- 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
- N108LS
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Northeast Florida Regional Airport (SGJ), St. Augustine, FLTo Northeast Florida Regional Airport (SGJ), St. Augustine, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 46 years (built 1973)
- 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
- Miscellaneous/other
- 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 power plant
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was conducting a practical test with a designated pilot examiner to add a multi-engine rating to her pilot certificate. After performing airwork in the local area, they returned to the departure airport to conduct takeoffs and landings. The pilot initiated the takeoff and reported that the airplane accelerated to 85 mph, then rotated as normal. She then reported that the airplane “discontinued climbing”; shortly thereafter, the examiner took control of the airplane. The examiner stated that there was inadequate runway remaining on which to land; however, the airplane would not fly out of ground effect. He maneuvered to avoid obstructions and the airplane impacted terrain with a descent rate between 400 to 600 feet per minute.
Postaccident examination of the front engine and its systems revealed no evidence of preimpact failure or malfunction. The rear propeller was found in the feathered position. Onboard engine monitor data for the accident flight revealed that, during the accident takeoff, the front engine was operating normally, while the rear engine was operating at a level below idle power. A successful postaccident test run of the rear engine revealed no evidence of malfunctions or anomalies that would have precluded normal operation. The airplane owner’s manual advised that, during takeoff, the pilot should apply rear engine power first, followed by front engine power, and monitor the engine instruments throughout the takeoff roll for signs of power loss. A placard on the instrument panel advised, “Do not initiate single engine take-off.”
Although the reason that the rear engine was operating at such a low level during the accident takeoff could not be determined, both pilots should have recognized that the rear engine was not operating as expected during the takeoff roll and aborted the takeoff. The continuation of the takeoff in this condition resulted in the airplane’s inability to climb and its subsequent descent and impact with terrain.
Probable cause
The failure of the pilot and examiner to recognize that the rear engine was not developing power, which resulted in an attempted partial-power takeoff and the airplane’s subsequent descent and impact with terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA19LA282
- Event ID
- 20190924X31842
- Case number
- ERA19LA282
- 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, cause areas. 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: 21d7a7537b77b2ca83f692b87de7398d8ea00ca805e8e7dec76099b38db679fc; retrieved 2026-09-16T10:12:38.925Z.