Borinquen Air

Douglas C-49 (DC-3)

The crew of an all cargo flight experienced a failure of the left engine while in the traffic pattern at their destination. They raised the landing gear but failed to feather the left propeller and failed to trim the aircraft. The resulting skid and increased drag made further flight impossible. The crew elected to ditch the aircraft in a lagoon about 2 miles southwest of the airport. The aircraft was not recovered from the lagoon and therefore it was not determined why the left engine lost power. Both pilots escaped with minor injuries.

Douglas DC-3

Shortly after takeoff, the aircraft's climb performance began to deteriorate and the right engine started to overheat. Subsequently, the right engine was feathered and the crew attempted to return to the airport. The radio transmitter became unintelligible, so the tower personnel cleared the aircraft to land on runway 10 and asked the crew to key their mike twice, if they understood. The mike waskeyed twice. The aircraft entered a right downwind for runway 10 at a very low altitude. According to witnesses, the aircraft went into a steep bank as it was turning onto a base leg over water, the right wing tip hit the water and the aircraft cartwheeled and crashed. The copilot reported that after feathering the right engine, the vmc of 84 kts was maintained; however, he believed the aircraft stalled just prior to impact. A teardown of the right engine revealed the edge of the #8 piston and its piston rings had failed. Metal filings were found in the oil and the oil pump was scored. There was evidence of oil starvation to the crankshaft journal, as well as piston slap associated with the ring failure.