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SEA93LA051

1993-01-14 · HANKSVILLE, Utah, United States · None · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed

Airport HVE

N550TH has since been reassigned. It is now registered to a different aircraft (DASSAULT FALCON 900 EX, built 2001), which was not involved in this event.

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

AN IMPROPER FUEL SELECTOR VALVE POSITION, FUEL STARVATION, AND INADEQUATE REMEDIAL ACTION. FACTORS INCLUDE SOFT, ROUGH TERRAIN.

Factual narrative

WHILE IN CRUISING FLIGHT, THE PILOT NOTICED THAT THE GAUGES INDICATED A FUEL IMBALANCE. AS THE IMBALANCE INDICATION BECAME GREATER, THE PILOT BEGAN TO SEARCH FOR A SUITABLE NEARBY ALTERNATE. FINDING THE NEAREST ALTERNATE TO BE BELOW APPROACH MINIMUMS, AND BEING CONVINCED THAT THE IMBALANCE WAS ONLY AN INDICATION PROBLEM, HE ELECTED TO CONTINUE ON TO THE ORIGINAL DESTINATION. WHEN BOTH ENGINES QUIT, THE LEFT GAUGE WAS AT 0, AND THE RIGHT GAUGE WAS INDICATING NEAR FULL. DURING THE RESTART ATTEMPTS, THE PILOT FAILED TO SELECT EITHER ENGINE TO THE RIGHT FUEL TANK, WHICH WAS LATER FOUND TO CONTAIN FUEL. WHEN EXAMINED AT THE SCENE OF THE ACCIDENT, THE POSITION OF BOTH FUEL VALVES CORRECTLY MATCHED THE POSITION OF THE CORRESPONDING FUEL SELECTOR LEVER. FURTHER INVESTIGATION REVEALED NO MALFUNCTION, DAMAGE, OR DISCREPANCIES WITH EITHER VALVE. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_1993_SEA93LA051.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

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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