The commercial pilot reported that, on the day of the accident, he filled each tank of the newly purchased Grumman American AA-1 with 12.5 gallons of fuel.
On his first flight, after about 20 minutes of flying, he noticed he was running out of fuel. He thought the fuel burn was very high and decided to land at the nearest airport, where he added about 24 gallons of fuel.
After departure and about 30 minutes of flying, he again noticed that the airplane was running out of fuel. He planned to land at the nearest airport, however, about 15 miles away from the airport, the engine lost total power.
The pilot switched fuel tanks and turned on the electric boost pump, and the engine restarted. A few minutes later, the engine lost total power again.
The pilot noticed both fuel tanks were out of fuel.
During a forced landing in a field near Warthen, Georgia, the airframe was substantially damaged.
Post-accident examination of the engine revealed that the carburetor float bowl plug was missing, which allowed fuel to leak out of the carburetor.
This means the airplane’s fuel consumption during the flight would have increased substantially and likely resulted in exhaustion of the airplane’s available fuel supply at a greater-than-normal rate.
Although the pilot reported that the airplane was recently inspected before he purchased it, no maintenance records were available for review, so the scope of work done to, or inspections of, the carburetor could not be determined.
Further, the pilot’s decision to depart on the accident flight leg after noting excessive fuel consumption on the previous leg contributed to the accident.
Probable cause: A fuel leak from the carburetor float bowl due to a missing plug, which resulted in excessive fuel consumption and a total loss of engine power due to fuel exhaustion. Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s decision to depart on the accident flight leg after noting the airplane’s unexpectedly high fuel consumption during the previous leg.
NTSB Identification: ERA18TA250
This September 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.
I asked again: Was this Pilot Error or Pilot Training Error? what do you think is that ratio? 5% pilot error and 95% pilot training error or ???
We FASTA USA have recommended to the NTSB, EAA, AOPA, FAA…for their support that anyone who is pilot-in-command or a student – who flies an aircraft they have never flown before – ( 1st time ) must be required to review the past accident – incident and mechanical incidents of that specific type, make and model. Yes? No?
This was a maintenance issue and on many aircraft decowling would be required to access the plug in question. Certainly not part of a preflight.
And had the plug been missing while on the ground the carb would have been empty, there would have been a very large puddle of fuel on the ground under the engine, and possibly the engine wouldn’t have even started because of the fuel running out as fast as it was being pumped in to the bowl.
Perhaps people trying to fix stupid should read their own comments. But then, they’d have to know what they were talking about to recognize the problem, and wouldn’t be making stupid comments in the first place and crying for more regulation to save themselves.
It is certainly a failure of an A&P to not have checked the security of the drain plug AND be sure that the safety wire was put back.
There was, supposedly a pre-buy inspection by an A&P.
BTW, I drain the carb bowl during the annual. There is usually some grit that gets past the gascolator.
The 1 st time he landed after 20 min. and added 23 gallons , that should have been a red flag that there is a serious fuel problem !
I also am surprised that the engine would run with the drain plug missing..
Maybe he started it with the boost pump on. ?
You make a lot of arrogant assumptions, and all of them are, as you put it, stupid.
The carburetor bowl holds very little fuel. Most of the volume in the bowl is taken up by the float, so there wouldn’t have been much of a puddle left to see – if any.
The engine driven fuel pump provides an overcapacity and more than enough pressure to keep the bowl full, even with the plug missing. So the engine would start and run with no indication that anything was wrong. You did read the report didn’t you? He did start it and fly it that way, twice.
I like your scenario. The plug fell out in flight causing extraordinary fuel depletion, and a fuel pressure gauge reading extremely low or zero.
He landed and did a shutdown with fuel shooting out of the carb at some degree of pressure and splashing everywhere. Someone then fueled the troubled aircraft while passing by or walking through the puddle of fuel, still dripping from the cowling. Perhaps checked the oil also with fuel vapor wafting out of the inspection door. He then, despite all of this, got back in, flew off without fuel pressure showing and made it back without the hot exhaust setting off all this splashing fuel and vapor.
Yup, I like your version, along with unstated assumptions, much better.
Truthfully I don’t really believe all of the pilot’s story.
The engine had a carburetor, so no pressure gauge.
As he taxied to the fuel pumps , there certainly would be a trail of fuel.
But once the engine is shut down, there is no fuel being pumped to the carb, so it would leave a small puddle, which will evaporate quickly.
There would certainly be the smell of fuel and should have caused concern, in addition to the aircraft using 23 gallons of fuel in 20-30 milutes..!!
My Mooney is a carbed O-360 and certainly has a fuel gauge, as did my carbed PA28-161. 3 to 6 pounds is a normal reading.
I’ll suspended conversation at this point due to your lack of actual knowledge and experience on the topic.
Adios.
Sorry Scott,
I’m not an A&P, so I don’t know every aircraft. I’m just a pilot and own an old Cessna 175B, with no fuel pump….gravity feed.
An an engineer, I comment on what the data seems to imply.
Most of the NTSB reports are incomplete, and lack a lot of detail that would be helpful in preventing future occurrences of the condition that caused the accident.
In this case it’s just a tightened plug and a safety wire.
For any pilot of any experience, if you burn through 24 gallon of fuel in 20 minutes and only have 22 usable there is nothing but incompetence left to explain not looking at your fuel gauges until 30 minutes into the next flight. His Commercial ticket should be toast. The second flight should have never happened for crying out loud. But failing that, even if no other symptoms on the ground (unlikely) he should have stayed in the pattern for 5 minutes. If the tanks were down to 3/4 then problem confirmed; land!
Higher ratings ≠ better pilot
Probably fell out during last flight. Inadequate tightening and not safety wired. Safety wire is only a redundancy, my Vermeer rock trenchers don’t have anything wired and fasteners don’t fall out…if they’re installed correctly.
Better maintenance=not crashing
FAA needs to update all inspection criteria to include that any missing component renders the aircraft as junk.
😂
Accidents like this keep happening. Ironically there is little FAA can do.
Sure there is…they can either yank the airworthiness cert of the aircraft or yank the guys ticket or suspend it for some good long period of time for KNOWINGLY getting into the air with a broken plane. There is no way this happens without the guy SEEING fuel on the ground or fuel flying around him in the air. This level of leak is too heavy not to see it.
He wouldn’t have been able to see it in the air – it would be streaming out under the belly of the airplane. When the engine was shut down on the ground, the leak stopped, so there wouldn’t be anything to see then either unless he crawled around under it.
He’s just lucky it didn’t ignite and have him returning to earth in the form of a flaming fireball.
There are guys like this. I won’t call him a pilot, since he violated a number of regs.
– no vaild airworthiness certificate.
– aircraft registration expired/ certificate missing
– no proper pilot certificate
– no medical cert.
With 2 folks doing a pre-purchase inspection, how does no one notice a missing carb. drain plug ?
If it was there for the inspection , no one noticed a missing safety wire ?
The pics of the carb. also show teflon tape on the fuel fitting threads… not allowed.!
Then, how does this guy not see a stream of fuel under the aircraft ? It used 23 gallons of fuel in 30 minutes…..46 gph is a huge problem.!
The guy is not only stupid, he’s an idiot.! And he newly acquired aircraft is junk.
Screw-ups on so many levels one doesn’t know where to begin.