CEN23LA367 · Cessna 172B
Cessna 172B · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) on approach
From San Angelo Regional Mathis Field (SJT) to San Angelo Regional Mathis Field (SJT)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN23LA367
- 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
Cessna 172B
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 172
- 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
- N7509X
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From San Angelo Regional Mathis Field (SJT), San Angelo, TXTo San Angelo Regional Mathis Field (SJT), San Angelo, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 63 years (built 1960)
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern downwind
- 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 power plant
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that shortly after takeoff the engine began running rough and the engine lost partial power. The pilot made a forced landing back to the departure airport. During the landing, the airplane touched down hard and departed the side of the runway, which resulted in substantial damage to the left wing. Postaccident examination of the carburetor revealed fuel stains around the outside of the fuel bowl and in the throat of the fuel bowl. Five of the six bolts holding the throttle body to the fuel bowl were found only finger-tight. The partial loss of engine power was most likely the result of air being drawn into the fuel bowl due to the loose bolts. The last annual inspection was completed on the engine in January of 2023. Investigators did not determine the last time maintenance was specifically performed on the carburetor.
Probable cause
A partial loss of engine power due to loose bolts holding the carburetor throttle body to the fuel bowl.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN23LA367
- Event ID
- 20230817192893
- Case number
- CEN23LA367
- 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: 8edb9d04fff85087946ceb56442447dd08db8ef9812a492bcac2b87fc6a13a2f; retrieved 2026-09-16T18:01:05.723Z.