CEN22LA115 · Piper PA-28R-201
Piper PA-28R-201 · Accident during initial climb
From Johnson County Executive Airport (OJC) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN22LA115
- 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-28R-201
- 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
- N5145W
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Johnson County Executive Airport (OJC), Olathe, KSTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 45 years (built 1977)
- 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
- Unknown or undetermined
- 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
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 landed at the airport and added fuel to the airplane. On departure, when the airplane was about 700 ft above ground level, the engine stopped producing power. Recorded engine data showed a decrease in engine rpm, cylinder head temperature, and exhaust gas temperature about 2 minutes after takeoff. The pilot performed a forced landing to a field, which resulted in substantial damage to the airplane’s fuselage and wings. An examination of the engine and fuel system did not reveal any preimpact mechanical anomalies that would have precluded normal operations. The engine’s throttle body and fuel flow divider were sent for further examination. The bench test of the fuel servo indicated that the fuel flow was within tolerances; however, the idle fuel flow was lean with the metering head increased to the maximum limit. The examination of fuel servo and fuel flow divider found contamination with a substance consistent with a lubricant normally used during the assembly of the fuel servo. The fuel flow was within tolerances, and it is unlikely that the contamination would have resulted in the loss of engine power. Investigators were unable to determine the reason for the loss of engine power.
Probable cause
The total loss of engine power for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN22LA115
- Event ID
- 20220207104602
- Case number
- CEN22LA115
- 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: f2639bad5aeb7b3f2b096813b7f25b536737b3dd9b58945a45f6d3e66fdcb7b4; retrieved 2026-09-16T14:56:20.839Z.