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FTW91FA055

1991-03-21 · PASADENA, Texas, United States · Fatal · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed

Airport EFD

N888G has since been reassigned. It is now registered to a different aircraft (BELL TEXTRON CANADA LTD 505, built 2021), which was not involved in this event.

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

POWER LOSS DUE TO FUEL EXHAUSTION RESULTANT FROM THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO REFUEL AT AN ALTERNATE DESTINATION AND THE INADVERTENT STALL. FACTORS WERE THE DARK NIGHT AND WEATHER CONDITIONS.

Factual narrative

THE AIRPLANE EXPERIENCED AN ENGINE FAILURE DUE TO FUEL EXHAUSTION WHILE ON FINAL BETWEEN THE FAF AND THE THRESHOLD ON A SECOND ILS APPROACH IN NIGHT IMC AFTER A FLIGHT OF 5.1 HOURS. A MISSED APPROACH WAS EXECUTED ON THE FIRST WHEN THE PILOT DEVIATED BEYOND LIMITS BOTH IN ALTITUDE AND COURSE. THE PILOT HAD FLIGHT PLANNED 3:45 ETE AND INDICATED THAT HE HAD 6:00 HOURS OF FUEL ON BOARD. THE FUEL EXHAUSTION TIME CORRESPONDED WITH PERFORMANCE DATA PROVIDED IN THE AIRPLANE OWNER'S HANDBOOK. ALTHOUGH HE RECEIVED A WEATHER BRIEFING PRIOR TO DEPARTURE AND OBTAINED WEATHER EN ROUTE, THE PILOT DID NOT REQUEST WIND ALOFT INFORMATION. THE FLIGHT ENCOUNTERED 35 TO 40 KNOT HEAD WINDS THROUGHOUT THE TRIP AND ON 4 SEPARATE OCCASIONS THE CONTROLLERS ASKED THE PILOT IF HE HAD ENOUGH FUEL TO REACH HIS DESTINATION. DURING THE FINAL LEG OF THE FLIGHT THE PILOT OVERFLEW AT LEAST 3 SUITABLE ALTERNATE AIRPORTS. FOLLOWING THE ENGINE FAILURE, THE PILOT ALLOWED THE AIRPLANE TO STALL AND IT SUBSEQUENTLY IMPACTED THE GROUND IN STEEP NOSE DOWN, LEFT WING LEADING ATTITUDE. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_1991_FTW91FA055.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Related research

Matched on aircraft type or causal vocabulary (stall, fuel exhaustion, engine failure, imc). All research papers