CEN23LA068 · Grumman American AA-5B
Grumman American AA-5B · Accident: fuel related during initial climb
From Port of South Louisiana Executive Regional Airport (APS) to Port of South Louisiana Executive Regional Airport (APS)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN23LA068
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Grumman American AA-5B
- Aircraft type
- Grumman American AA-5
- 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
- N321GD
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Port of South Louisiana Executive Regional Airport (APS), Reserve, LATo Port of South Louisiana Executive Regional Airport (APS), Reserve, LA
- 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
- Fuel related
- 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 systems
- Environmental issues › Conditions/weather/phenomena
- 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
The pilot receiving instruction and his flight instructor were conducting an instructional flight in night instrument meteorological conditions when the airplane had a partial loss of engine power shortly after takeoff. The pilot-receiving-instruction reported that about 500 ft above the ground the engine began “coughing/sputtering” and there was a decrease in engine rpm. The flight instructor stated that the engine speed decreased to about 1,400 rpm, but when he leaned the fuel mixture the engine speed increased about 200 rpm. The flight instructor made a left 180° turn back toward the airport. The airplane’s left-wing tip impacted the ground, the nose gear collapsed, and the engine partially separated from the firewall when the airplane impacted the terrain during the forced landing.
The postaccident engine examination did not reveal any evidence of mechanical malfunction that would have precluded normal operation. Additionally, the airplane had ample fuel available that did not contain any water or debris.
The weather conditions at the time of the accident were conducive to a serious accumulation of carburetor icing with the engine operating at cruise power. According to a Federal Aviation Administration Special Airworthiness Information Bulletin, pilots should use carburetor heat while in weather conditions where carburetor icing is probable. The flight instructor stated that he did not use carburetor heat after the loss of engine power.
Based on the available information, the partial loss of engine power was likely due to carburetor ice accumulation. Additionally, the low altitude at which the loss of engine power occurred significantly reduced the amount of time available to the flight instructor to troubleshoot and restore engine power before the forced landing.
Probable cause
The partial loss of engine power due to carburetor icing and the flight instructor’s failure to use carburetor heat in weather conditions conducive to serious carburetor icing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN23LA068
- Event ID
- 20221222106486
- Case number
- CEN23LA068
- 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: 671617ec2dd6ea004059684456907a18d188d432dfcb80004f49e558522a1085; retrieved 2026-09-16T16:37:52.243Z.