ERA23LA061 · Piper PA28 180
Sundowner Aviation Piper PA28 180 · Accident: loss of engine power (total) during initial climb
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA23LA061
- 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 PA28 180
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA28
- 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
- N6303J
- Operator
- Sundowner Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 54 years (built 1968)
- 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
Cause areas
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flight instructor was conducting a local instructional flight with a new student pilot. Following the preflight inspection and engine start, the flight instructor noted that the fuel selector looked to be positioned “in the right place,” and that neither he nor the student touched the fuel selector for the entirety of the accident flight. They subsequently conducted about 15 to 20 minutes of the instructional lesson on the ground, while the engine was running. During engine run-up, the flight instructor noted that “the fuel pressure indicator went to zero” so he turned on the airplane’s electric fuel pump and the fuel pressure recovered. After 1 to 2 minutes, the flight instructor turned off the electric fuel pump and the fuel pressure returned to the normal range and remained there. After takeoff, and during the initial climb, the engine started to “lose and gain power,” so the flight instructor attempted a turn back to the departure runway. Halfway through the turn, the airplane lost all engine power, and the flight instructor landed the airplane in a grassy area, but encountered uneven terrain. The airplane sustained substantial damage to the left wing during the landing.
Initial postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that the fuel selector was of a configuration that the handle of the rotary valve faced away from the fuel tank being selected, while the opposite side of the handle indicated the selected tank or shutoff position. The operator had painted a gray/white stripe on the handle and fuel selector valve placard that showed the selected tank to aid pilots in correctly selecting the desired position. Following the accident, the flight instructor stated that he was confused by the white paint stripe on the fuel selector. He also stated that the airplane’s owner advised him after the accident that the fuel selector had been found in the “off” position after the accident.
The wreckage was subsequently disposed of by the owner, and no additional detailed examination was conducted to determine if the fuel selector valve handle, the valve mechanism itself, or fuel selector valve placard were correctly oriented and that the internal valve mechanism was intact, nor were the engine or fuel system otherwise examined or tested. Based on this information, the reason for the loss of engine power could not be determined.
Probable cause
A loss of engine power during initial climb for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA23LA061
- Event ID
- 20221116106301
- Case number
- ERA23LA061
- 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: 63f0f38aec81bf9af1a9f56fe953c722578504e1f8177345030ec2df9b47b9e1; retrieved 2026-09-16T16:23:33.581Z.