The mechanic who maintained the Piper Aerostar 601 reported that, on the morning of the accident, the right engine would not start due to water contamination in the fuel system.
The commercial pilot and mechanic purged the fuel tanks, flushed the fuel system, and cleaned the left engine fuel injector nozzles.
After the maintenance work, they completed engine ground runs for each engine with no anomalies noted.
The pilot then ordered new fuel from the FBO to complete a maintenance test flight.
He completed a preflight inspection, followed by engine run-ups for each engine with no anomalies noted and then departed with one passenger onboard. Immediately after takeoff, the right engine stopped producing full power, and the airplane would not maintain altitude.
No remaining runway was left to land, so he made a forced landing to a field about one mile from the runway at the airport in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
The airplane landed hard and came to rest upright.
Postaccident examination revealed no water contamination in the engines.
Examination of the airplane revealed numerous instances of improper and inadequate maintenance of the engines and fuel system. The fuel system contained corrosion debris, and minimal fuel was found in the lines to the fuel servo.
Although maintenance was conducted on the airplane on the morning of the accident, the right engine fuel injectors nozzles were not removed during the maintenance procedures, therefore it is likely that the fuel flow volume was not measured.
It is likely that the corrosion debris in the fuel system resulted when the water was recently purged from the fuel system. The contaminants were likely knocked loose during the subsequent engine runs and attempted takeoff, which subsequently blocked the fuel lines and starved the right engine of available fuel.
Probable cause: The loss of right engine power due to fuel starvation, which resulted from corrosion debris in the fuel lines. Contributing to the accident was the mechanic’s and pilot’s inadequate maintenance of the airplane before the flight.
NTSB Identification: CEN18LA285
This July 2018 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.
My only experience with an Aerostar was in Wichita KS winter time. Customer couldn’t keep engines running upon start-eup from hangar. Pulled to shop and we heated up the frozen bird. two hours later we start to drain fuel sumps to find some water in most of them. Owner knew little if anything about plane. We decided to sump the center tank and removed approx. 1.5 gallon of water from that tank alone which was ice before we started the drainage. We sumped the plane several times. Told the owner about all of the drain sumps so he could do it himself later on. I believe that he didn’t want to get dirty crawling under the belly to drain the main sump figuring draining the nacelles was good enough. The aircraft flew out just find after a little PM.