NYC95LA045 · Cessna 150H
Cessna 150H · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From Washington County Airport (AFJ) to Herron Airport (7G1)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's departure or destination. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC95LA045
- 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
Cessna 150H
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 150
- 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
- N7175S
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route Possible conflict
- From Washington County Airport (AFJ), Washington, PATo Herron Airport (7G1), New Cumberland, WV
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern final
- 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)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Fuel system › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Became lost/disoriented, inadvertent
- Pilot in command › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE STUDENT PILOT WAS CONDUCTING A SOLO, CROSS-COUNTRY FLIGHT. HE BECAME LOST AND DISORIENTED AS HE RETURNED TO HIS DEPARTURE AIRPORT. HE WAS VECTORED TO AN AIRPORT AND STARTED A VISUAL APPROACH. THE ENGINE QUIT ON SHORT FINAL, AND HE WAS UNABLE TO GLIDE TO THE RUNWAY. THE AIRPLANE IMPACTED A FENCE. THE FAA EXAMINED THE AIRPLANE AND FOUND ONE GALLON OF FUEL IN THE TANKS. THE STUDENT, WHO OWNED THE AIRPLANE, DID NOT OBTAIN HIS INSTRUCTOR'S AUTHORIZATION FOR THE CROSS COUNTRY.
Probable cause
The student pilot's inadequately planned cross-country flight, and his subsequent disorientation, resulting in fuel exhaustion and a collision with an object.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC95LA045
- Event ID
- 20001206X02791
- Case number
- NYC95LA045
- 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: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 9c5e591cdf87a441e0d0d40415dc3eaeb410328ccd0811e343657852d7350c0a; retrieved 2026-09-21T22:25:14.098Z.