LAX94LA121 · Grumman AA-1A
Grumman AA-1A · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Santa Monica Municipal Airport (SMO) to Mammoth Yosemite Airport (MMH)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX94LA121
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Grumman AA-1A
- Aircraft type
- Grumman AA-1
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N9614U
- Operator
- Charles H. Thomas · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Santa Monica Municipal Airport (SMO), Santa Monica, CATo Mammoth Yosemite Airport (MMH), Mammoth Lakes, CA
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- En route · cruise
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Total loss of engine power (non-mechanical)
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Fuel exhaustion
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Fluid, fuel › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Fuel consumption calculations, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT SAID HE DEPARTED AT 1455 WITH FULL FUEL, AND WITH THE LEFT TANK SELECTED. AT 1610 HOURS, HE SWITCHED TO THE RIGHT FUEL TANK WHEN THE GAUGE FOR THE LEFT INDICATED ONE-QUARTER. ONE HOUR 10 MINUTES LATER, THE PILOT SWITCHED BACK TO THE LEFT FUEL TANK AND THE ENGINE QUIT. THE PILOT TURNED ON THE ELECTRIC BOOST PUMP AND SWITCHED BACK TO THE RIGHT TANK; THE ENGINE RAN FOR A FEW MINUTES, THEN QUIT AGAIN. THE PILOT TURNED TOWARD AN AIRPORT 12 MILES AWAY, BUT THE AIRCRAFT HAD INSUFFICIENT ALTITUDE TO REACH THE AIRPORT AND THE PILOT LANDED IN A FIELD. THE AIRCRAFT ENCOUNTERED SOFT SOIL AND NOSED OVER. NO FUEL WAS FOUND IN THE AIRCRAFT TANKS. THE SOIL BENEATH THE AIRCRAFT WAS EXAMINED, WITH NO ODOR OF FUEL EVIDENT. THE FUEL SYSTEM WAS EXAMINED BY A MECHANIC WITH NO SYSTEM DISCREPANCIES NOTED. NO FUEL WAS FOUND IN THE FUEL LINES FROM THE WING ROOT TO THE FUEL SELECTOR, AND ONLY RESIDUAL FUEL WAS NOTED IN THE FUEL LINE FROM THE SELECTOR VALVE TO THE ELECTRIC BOOST PUMP.
Probable cause
fuel exhaustion due to the pilot's inadequate preflight planning and en route fuel consumption monitoring.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX94LA121
- Event ID
- 20001206X00767
- Case number
- LAX94LA121
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1994-02-12.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 7b2f20b1cdbf21e98a2ab6681d72dff334fd1e496259c4ad3a1a6534034b1e89; retrieved 2026-09-23T01:20:38.258Z.