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CEN21LA383

2021-08-24 · Gypsum, Colorado, United States · None · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed

Airport EGE

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

A loss of engine power due to fuel starvation and the pilot's mismanagement of the available fuel.

Factual narrative

The pilot reported that the airplane’s fuel tanks were filled to the tabs during the preflight. He then departed on about a two-hour local flight, which included touch and go landings. He added that he did a soft field technique, where he pulled up abruptly. The engine then ran rough, so he leveled off, and the engine regained power briefly, before going to idle rpm. He lowered the flaps for the forced landing. During the forced landing, the left wing separated from the airplane after impact with a fence post. The pilot stated that he ran the fuel tank too low and when he pulled up during the takeoff, the remaining fuel was unable to reach the engine. He added that he “just ran the left tank too long without switching” fuel tanks. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database Retrieved: 2026-02-12

NTSB Findings

FAA avdata. C = Cause, F = Factor.

  • — Aircraft-Fluids/misc hardware-Fluids-Fuel-Fluid management
  • — Personnel issues-Action/decision-Info processing/decision-Identification/recognition-Pilot

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_2021_CEN21LA383.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Search this event elsewhere

External sources are reported, not agency: signal that something happened, not fact about what happened.

Related research

Matched on aircraft type or causal vocabulary (fuel starvation). All research papers