CEN25LA111 · Piper PA-28-140
Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: loss of engine power (partial) during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to La Porte Municipal Airport (T41)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN25LA111
- 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
- Ongoing
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- 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-28-140
- 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
- N54479
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo La Porte Municipal Airport (T41), La Porte, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 52 years (built 1973)
- 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 (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
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
On March 6, 2025, about 1145 central standard time, a Piper PA-28-140 airplane, N54479, was substantially damaged when it was involved in an accident near Pearland, Texas. One pilot sustained minor injuries, and the other pilot was not injured. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 personal flight. The pilot reported that he departed the Pearland Regional Airport (LVJ), Pearland, Texas, and was destined for La Porte Municipal Airport (T41), La Porte, Texas. The left-seat pilot assumed the duties of pilot flying (PF) for the take-off from LVJ. The pilot monitoring (PM), seated in the right seat, stated that he noticed the tachometer was reading about 2,350 rpm during the takeoff roll from runway 14, which he noted was lower than normal. The PM directed the PF to increase the airplane’s airspeed before rotation. The PM stated that the airplane rotated about 65-67 mph, the engine instruments were “green,” and the engine sounded normal. About 200 ft above ground level, both pilots noticed that the engine rpm had decreased to about 2,200. The PM told the PF to pitch for 85 mph for the airplane’s “best climb.” The vertical speed indicator indicated a 100 foot-per-minute climb but then settled to level flight. The PM took over the PF duties. He pitched the airplane to achieve “best glide” and planned to conduct a forced landing to a field about 1 mile from the departure end of runway 14. The engine continued operating with partial power during the forced landing. The airplane impacted a wood pile and came to rest along a dirt embankment. A post-impact fire ensued and both pilots were able to egress using the main door. The airplane sustained substantial damage. Before the flight, the airplane was filled with 47 gallons of 87-octane ethanol-free automotive fuel. The airplane was recovered for further examination.
Verbatim NTSB factual narrative from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN25LA111
- Event ID
- 20250306199809
- Case number
- CEN25LA111
- 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. 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: c4d8495b8f50d9b44dbbaa7113b724835334548afddfcc36a72ef31339c67189; retrieved 2026-09-16T19:42:45.195Z.