SEA95LA026 · Bellanca 17-30A
Bellanca 17-30A · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Sunshine Acres Airport (WA21) to Norman Grier Field (S36)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA95LA026
- 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
Bellanca 17-30A
- Aircraft type
- Bellanca 17
- 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
- N39852
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Sunshine Acres Airport (WA21), Electric City, WATo Norman Grier Field (S36), Kent, WA
- 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 · descent
- 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 starvation
- 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 › Starvation
- Fuel supply › Restricted
- Pilot in command › Starting procedure, not followed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT STATED THAT THE FUEL-INJECTED ENGINE SUDDENLY LOST POWER WHILE THE AIRPLANE WAS DESCENDING THROUGH 3,000 FEET MSL FOR LANDING. THINKING THAT HE HAD DEPLETED ONE OF THE AIRPLANE'S FUEL TANKS, HE SWITCHED TANKS AND ATTEMPTED TO RESTART THE ENGINE WITHOUT ACTIVATING THE FUEL BOOST PUMP AS PER THE AIRPLANE FLIGHT MANUAL. THE ENGINE DID NOT START AND THE AIRPLANE WAS FORCE LANDED. IT IMPACTED A BERM AND WAS SUBSTANTIALLY DAMAGED. EVIDENCE OF SOME USABLE FUEL WAS FOUND IN BOTH TANKS. AN ESTIMATED 55 GALLONS OF FUEL WAS CONSUMED SINCE THE AIRPLANE WAS LAST REFUELED; THE AIRPLANE HOLDS 60 GALLONS OF USABLE FUEL. NO STANDING FUEL WAS FOUND IN ANY OF THE ENGINE FUEL COMPONENTS. ACCORDING TO THE AIRPLANE MANUFACTURER, THE 'CRITICAL ATTITUDE' FOR DETERMINING USABLE FUEL QUANTITY IS 'NOSE DOWN.' AN EXAMINATION OF THE ENGINE DID NOT REVEAL EVIDENCE OF ANY MECHANICAL DEFICIENCIES. THE AIRPLANE HAD PREVIOUS DISCREPANCIES WITH ITS FUEL SYSTEM, BUT THEY WERE RESOLVED PRIOR TO THE ACCIDENT.
Probable cause
FUEL STARVATION DUE TO THE UNPORTING OF THE USEABLE FUEL SUPPLY, AND THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO FOLLOW THE AIRPLANE'S PUBLISHED ENGINE STARTING PROCEDURES AFTER THE LOSS OF FUEL FLOW DURING DESCENT. FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT ARE THE PILOT'S LACK OF FAMILIARITY WITH THE AIRPLANE, AND A BERM.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA95LA026
- Event ID
- 20001206X02798
- Case number
- SEA95LA026
- 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: 624974ffc94bdb7a670659ccf80a2b3fbf9eaaf5543104b19e6fb5466f710f86; retrieved 2026-09-21T13:30:25.560Z.