The pilot of a small, single-engine plane that on a secluded, high-altitude Garfield County snowfield told air crash investigators that he lost engine power before going down.
The National Transportation Safety Board, in a preliminary report about the Jan. 7 incident, said the pilot reported having erratic readings from his cylinder head and exhaust gas temperatures on the plane’s multi-function display.
“Since he had had previous trouble with the sensory input unit, he reverted to monitoring the analog gauges,” the report says. “Shortly thereafter, the engine backfired and lost power.”
The plane went down in deep snow at an elevation of 11,700 feet in the Devil’s Causeway and McGinnis Lake area of western Colorado. The Garfield County Sheriff’s Office said that day the temperature at that elevation was minus 18 degrees.
Another pilot in the area saw the plane going down and that pilot was able to communicate with the two occupants of the downed plane and identify their location.
The aircraft, a Cirrus SR22, had taken off from an airport in Provo, Utah, and was headed to Colorado Springs. The pilot and his passenger were not injured, though the NTSB says their airplane was substantially damaged.
The NTSB reports there were visual flight conditions at the crash site.
