CEN21LA293 · Piper PA-28-140
Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Conroe-North Houston Regional Airport (KCXO)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN21LA293
- 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
- Event fatalities
- Unknown
- 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-28-140
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N4216J
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Conroe-North Houston Regional Airport (KCXO), Conroe, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 55 years (built 1966)
- 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 (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
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
According to the pilot and pilot-rated passenger, the airspeed did not increase during the initial climb. The pilot discontinued the climb and made a right turn to avoid trees. The pilot landed the airplane in a nearby construction site, and the airplane struck an embankment, which substantially damaged the fuselage and left wing. Neither the pilot nor the pilot-rated passenger reported noticing any deficiencies with the airplane during the preflight, taxi, or engine run-up. A witness heard the engine run-up and stated that the engine ran rough when the magneto check was performed. This witness and another witness reported that the engine did not sound as if it were producing full power when the airplane began to take off. They reported that the airplane did not become airborne until it was about half way down the runway. A postaccident examination of the airplane did not reveal any anomalies that could be attributed to a loss of engine power. Based on the available evidence, the airplane’s engine was likely not producing full power, which was evident during the pre-takeoff engine run-up. The pilot elected to continue the takeoff with degraded engine power, resulting in an inability to climb and a subsequent forced landing during which the airplane was damaged. The reason for the engine’s degraded performance could not be determined based on available information. At the time of the accident flight, the departure airport was scheduled to be permanently closed the following day, and the purpose of the flight was to relocate the airplane to a nearby airport. The pilot’s self-induced pressure to move the airplane likely contributed to his decision to continue the flight with degraded engine performance.
Probable cause
The pilot’s decision to continue the takeoff with degraded engine performance, which resulted in an inability to climb and a subsequent forced landing. The reason for the engine’s degraded performance could not be determined based on available information.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN21LA293
- Event ID
- 20210628103353
- Case number
- CEN21LA293
- 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, 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: cb24a66999ffe0627262a9295d53151a897557d2c39e728d00ef13922dcaf792; retrieved 2026-09-16T14:13:18.754Z.