In preparation for a local flight, the pilot performed a preflight inspection of the Cessna 210, which included checking the fuel gauges, but he did not look into the fuel tanks to verify the fuel quantity.
He recalled that both fuel gauges indicated below half full.
The engine start, taxi, and run-up were performed uneventfully, however, several minutes after takeoff, the engine lost all power.
The pilot was unable to restart the engine and performed a forced landing to a cornfield about six miles north of the departure airport in Oneonta, N.Y. The forced landing was performed with the landing gear retracted, and the airplane came to rest upright, which resulted in substantial damage to the right wing and fuselage.
Due to injuries sustained in the accident, the pilot had no further recollection of the accident flight.
Examination of the wreckage revealed that the left main fuel tank had about five gallons of fuel remaining and that the right main fuel tank had no fuel. The fuel selector was found positioned to the right main fuel tank.
No fuel was found in the fuel line connecting the gascolator to the engine-driven fuel pump and in the fuel line connecting the engine-driven fuel pump to the fuel flow divider.
Probable cause: The pilot’s inadequate preflight inspection and fuel planning, which resulted in a total loss of engine power due to fuel starvation.
NTSB Identification: ERA15LA258
This July 2015 accident report is provided by the National Transportation Safety Board. Published as an educational tool, it is intended to help pilots learn from the misfortunes of others.
So when I checked my gauges on the preflight the left tank showed a third of a tank but when I dipped it it was empty when I dip the right tank?? it at 20 gallons. You just can’t rely on the gauges ?
When engine quits try switching tanks to see if it will restart? Is this not one of the primary steps in any engine power loss checklist? Duh!
Another one bites the dust. You just can’t fix stupid
Same song, different verse. It would have been so easy to use a dip stick to check the amount of fuel in the tanks.
NTSB should also say something about, contributing cause, fuel gage was not reading as required by regs. But that would mean they would have to do more than just a pro forma GA Pilot error report.
Fuel gauges are only required to be accurate when the tank is empty. A ladder, stool or fuel system drip gauge is necessary to verify that fuel is actually in the tank.But any system can fail.
The capacitance fuel gauge system in a King Air is said to be accurate to 2%. However when the tank is contaminated with microbes I have personal experience with a F90 King Air that ran out of fuel in the left tank at 85 knots on a night short field take-off.
The gauge said there was 90 gallons of fuel remaining. There is no way to visually see fuel level in the KS F90 except when it is full. However filling the tanks is not possible when the payload is maximum.
Accurate records of fuel were not available to me when I was assigned to fly a trip to a small airport and pickup six passengers and baggage for a one hour flight.
Bottom line, some aircraft require a ladder and perhaps a vapor-proof flashlight, some require faith or tools to remove covers and safety wired panels on a nacelle tank to verify a partial fuel load or a set of scales so the plane can be weighed before flight [the C5 has a built-in weight system].
The left engine quit at rotation and the right engine ran perfectly the few miles to the nearby planned fuel stop where the main tanks were topped. The useable fuel is 188 gallons per tank. The left engine took 192 gallons and the right tank 180 gallons. At that point the fuel gauges showed 1900 pounds, well past the full 1259.6 that is full.
The entire fuel system was removed and replaced because the plane operator in Europe did not use Prist. The ferry crew did not notice the fuel gauge needles pointing to 8 o’clock instead of the proper 4 o’clock full reading.