Event CEN20LA185

Factual narrative

On May 19, 2020, about 1930 central daylight time, a Cessna 501, N501KM, sustained substantial damage when it was involved in an accident at Houston Hobby Airport (HOU), Houston, Texas. The pilot was not injured. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 personal flight. While on final approach to HOU, the pilot lowered the landing gear and received two of three green landing gear position indicator lights. The left main landing gear light was not illuminated, and a warning horn sounded. The pilot recycled the landing gear with the same result. He reported the situation to HOU tower and asked if they could visually see whether all the airplane’s landing gear were down. The tower reported that all gear appeared down, as did the pilot of a commercial airliner who was taxiing on the airport. As per the pilot operating handbook, the pilot initiated an aggressive bank right, followed abruptly by a left bank to generate sufficient lateral G-forces on the landing gear in an attempt to get a gear locked indication on the left main gear. This attempt did not work. Upon landing, left main landing gear collapsed, the airplane veered left and came to a stop in a grassy area adjacent to runway resulting in structural damage to the left wing and underbelly of the airplane. The pilot exited the airplane and airport emergency services responded. Recovery personnel manually lifted and locked the left main landing gear down, and the airplane was towed to a hangar facility. The pilot reported that he decided to land because the left main landing gear indicator light had malfunctioned in years past, and it was found that the light had malfunctioned rather than the landing gear. The landing gear was examined under the supervision of a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) airworthiness inspector. Utilizing ground hydraulic and electrical power, the landing gear was cycled about 30 times with various hydraulic pressures. Both the nose landing gear and right main landing gear functioned normally. The cockpit landing gear position lights (nose, left main, and right main) functioned normally. The left landing gear actuator never locked in the down position under any hydraulic pressure setting. The only way to attain a locked down left main landing gear was to manually push the gear outward to the down and locked position. When the landing gear was pushed into the locked position, the left main landing gear down indicator light illuminated green. Evaluation of the left main landing gear actuator revealed that its internal down-lock mechanism was not functioning. According to the certified repair facility, the actuator is a component that is normally replaced at interval (37,000 cycles) or as needed. The FAA inspector reported that the aircraft logbook showed the left main actuator was original to the airplane and was last inspected on July 6, 2017, at 5,287 cycles. The logbook did not show any recent entries concerning anomalies with the left main landing gear. On final approach to his destination airport, the pilot lowered the landing gear for a full stop landing. He received two of three green landing gear down position indicator lights. The left main landing gear light was not illuminated, and a warning horn sounded. The pilot recycled the landing gear and received the same result. The pilot queried the tower and another airplane to confirm that his landing gear were extended, and both told the pilot that they saw all three gear extended. Consistent with airplane manufacturer guidance, the pilot then performed maneuvers to generate lateral G-force on the landing gear in an attempt to get a gear locked indication on the left main gear, which was not successful. Upon landing, the left main landing gear collapsed, and the airplane veered off the runway, resulting in substantial damage to the left wing and underbelly of the airplane. Examination of the airplane’s landing gear system revealed the internal down lock mechanism of the left main landing gear actuator malfunctioned. The cockpit gear position indicator lights functioned normally. There were no recent logbook entries concerning anomalies with the left main landing gear. 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).

• — Aircraft-Aircraft systems-Landing gear system-Landing gear actuator-Malfunction