NTSB CAROL · Event
Event CEN12CA006
Aircraft involved
Probable cause & findings
A total loss of engine power due to fuel starvation as a result of the pilot's improper fuel management.
Factual narrative
The pilot departed his private airstrip and was en route to a local airport to purchase fuel when the engine lost power. In an attempt to re-start the engine, the pilot moved the fuel selector from the left wing tank to the right wing tank and turned on the boost pump. He was unable to re-start the engine and made a forced landing to a cow pasture. Postaccident examination of the damaged airplane revealed substantial damage to the firewall and fuselage. A quart of fuel was drained from the left wing tank and 16 gallons of fuel was drained from the right wing tank. The pilot departed his private airstrip and was en route to a local airport to purchase fuel when the engine lost power. In an attempt to restart the engine, the pilot moved the fuel selector from the left wing tank to the right wing tank and turned on the boost pump. He was unable to restart the engine and made a forced landing to a cow pasture. During the landing sequence, the airplane impacted a dirt embankment. A postaccident examination of the airplane revealed substantial damage to the firewall and fuselage. A quart of fuel was drained from the left wing tank and 16 gallons of fuel was drained from the right wing tank. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database Retrieved: 2026-02-12
NTSB Findings
Hierarchical cause / factor breakdown from the FAA bulk avdata database. Each finding tagged C (Cause) or F (Factor).
- C Aircraft-Fluids/misc hardware-Fluids-Fuel-Fluid management - C
- C Personnel issues-Action/decision-Info processing/decision-Decision making/judgment-Pilot - C
Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file
NTSB_2011_CEN12CA006.txt.
Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb.
Full investigation docket on
data.ntsb.gov ↗.
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Related research
What the literature says.
Academic papers and agency reports matching this event's aircraft type or causal vocabulary (fuel starvation). Sourced from NASA NTRS, NTSB Safety Studies, FAA CAMI, AOPA Air Safety Institute, Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons, arXiv, and the Semantic Scholar academic graph.
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