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Atlas / NTSB / LAX92LA276

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event LAX92LA276

1992-07-02 HAYWARD, California, United States Airport · HWD None 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

THE EXPLOSION OF FUEL VAPORS IN THE RIGHT WING DUE TO THE PILOT'S OVERPRIMING OF THE RIGHT ENGINE DURING A START ATTEMPT AND AN UNCORRECTED PREEXISTING FUEL SYSTEM LEAK. A FACTOR IN THE ACCIDENT WAS INADEQUATE MAINTENANCE PERFORMED ON THE AIRCRAFT.

Factual narrative

THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE OVERPRIMED THE RIGHT ENGINE WHEN HE ATTEMPTED TO START IT. DURING THE START OPERATION, AN ACCUMULATION OF FUEL VAPOR LOCATED OUTBOARD OF THE RIGHT ENGINE EXPLODED AND RIPPED OPEN A YARD LONG PORTION OF THE RIGHT WING'S UPPER SKIN PANELS. EVIDENCE WAS OBSERVED OF AN UNCORRECTED PREEXISTING FUEL LEAK IN THE VICINITY OF THE RIGHT ENGINE'S AUXILIARY FUEL PUMP. THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE WAS AN A & P MECHANIC, AND HE OWNED, OPERATED AND MAINTAINED THE AIRPLANE. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_1992_LAX92LA276.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Related research

What the literature says.

Academic papers and agency reports matching this event's aircraft type or causal vocabulary (maintenance). Sourced from NASA NTRS, NTSB Safety Studies, FAA CAMI, AOPA Air Safety Institute, Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons, arXiv, and the Semantic Scholar academic graph.

Browse the full corpus — academia portal ↗