N3713T

On September 14, 2022, about 1140 mountain daylight time, a Piper PA-28R-180, N3713T, was substantially damaged when it was involved in an accident near Broomfield, Colorado. The pilot and passenger were not injured. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 personal flight.

The pilot recently purchased the airplane and had been flying it regularly in the three weeks before the accident. On the accident flight, the airplane departed from runway 16 at the Erie Municipal Airport (EIK), Erie, Colorado, where the airplane was based. When the airplane was about 200 ft AGL, the engine sustained a partial loss of power. The pilot reported that although the engine was still running, it was not producing enough power to climb. The pilot executed a forced landing to a residential area where the airplane nosed over and came to rest in a pond. Both wings sustained substantial damage.

Postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that the interior liner of the induction air hose between the air filter and the throttle body was partially collapsed inward. The exterior of the hose did not display obvious damage. No further preimpact anomalies that would explain the reported loss of engine power were found.

The airplane was equipped with a Garmin electronic flight instrument system (EFIS), but the system did not record engine parameters. Flight data recovered from the EFIS system was consistent with the pilot’s description of the flight. The engine instrumentation installed in the airplane consisted of non-recording analog gauges consistent with those installed during its manufacture in 1967.

The temperature and dew point about the time of the accident was conducive for carburetor icing at glide and cruise power settings.