Superior Air Parts Settles Case For Defective Aircraft Engine Crankshaft Which Resulted In Two Fatalities

Attorneys representing the family of James Kos and Dane Sheahen, who were fatally injured in a March 2016 RV-8 accident, have obtained a $5 million settlement from Superior Air Parts. The aircraft was equipped with an experimental aircraft engine developed by Superior Air Parts, Inc. with a crankshaft forged by Ruhrtaler Gesenkschmiede F.W. Wengeler GmbH & Co. KG which was found to be defective.

Dane Sheahen was piloting the RV-8 aircraft he had built from a kit containing a Superior Air Parts XP-400 experimental aircraft engine that had recently been developed to serve the growing experimental aircraft market. During the March 12, 2016 flight, the engine’s crankshaft broke and caused the plane to lose power and crash, fatally injuring both occupants.

“This engine and crankshaft had only been in operation 20 hours before the crankshaft suffered a fatigue failure which resulted in the crash,” said attorney Ladd Sanger. “There were no obvious metallurgical deficiencies in the crankshaft, therefore the failure was probably the result of detonation issues and unusual stresses caused by the Superior design.”

According to Sanger, “Superior Air Parts failed to adequately test the engine design before releasing it to the market. Once in the field, Superior knew these engines were suffering premature failures yet the company was slow to react until this tragic crash occurred.”

Attorneys Ladd Sanger of Slack Davis Sanger LLP, Kevin Boyle of Panish, Shea & Boyle and Joe Bosco of LaRose & Bosco represented the family.

(Source: News release. Image from file. Not accident aircraft)

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