CEN22LA089 · Lancair IV P
Lancair IV P · Accident: loss of engine power (total) during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Spruce Creek Airport (7FL6)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's damage. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN22LA089
- 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
Lancair IV P
- Aircraft type
- Lancair IV
- 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
- N994PT
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Spruce Creek Airport (7FL6), Daytona Beach, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 5 years (built 2016)
- 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 (total)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial Possible conflict
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he took off at a reduced winter takeoff power setting. Once airborne and established on a climb, he retracted the landing gear and flaps, added climb power in increments, and then noticed a failure displayed on the generator control unit annunciator. About the same time, the pilot noticed the engine was quieter and the airspeed was decreasing. Onboard data indicated that, upon reaching 650 ft above ground level, about 50 seconds after the takeoff roll was initiated, the engine power reduced to idle with a simultaneous decrease in fuel flow. Several seconds later, a generator control unit failure warning illuminated, and the voltage began to slowly decrease, consistent with the generator turning off. The airplane continued to descend straight ahead and impacted trees and terrain about one nautical mile from the departure end of the runway. Both wings, the empennage, and the engine separated from the fuselage.
Following the accident, the condition lever was in an aft position. The pilot stated that, due to the altitude at the time he identified the loss of engine power, he did not take any actions to feather the propeller or restart the engine. A postaccident examination of the engine and related systems revealed no evidence of any preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation. The recorded engine data is consistent with a reduction in commanded engine power and ultimately an in-flight shutdown. While it is possible that the condition lever came back with the flap activation and was not noted by the pilot, investigators were not able to determine when or how the condition lever was moved aft.
Probable cause
The total loss of engine power after takeoff for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN22LA089
- Event ID
- 20220103104465
- Case number
- CEN22LA089
- 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: 6375a9d02f41c3ba4d8878226a6770c44bb900b7638a0f7da37b88b2295269aa; retrieved 2026-09-16T14:51:32.193Z.