LAX95LA070 · Aero Commander 200D
Aero Commander 200D · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Apple Valley Airport (APV) to Rosamond Skypark Airport (L00)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX95LA070
- 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
- 1 · 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
Aero Commander 200D
- Aircraft type
- Aero Commander 200
- 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
- N200AW
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Apple Valley Airport (APV), Apple Valley, CATo Rosamond Skypark Airport (L00), Rosamond, 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 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
- Pilot in command › Fuel management, improper
- Pilot in command › Fuel supply, not selected
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT AND HIS THREE PASSENGERS WERE ON A CROSS-COUNTRY FLIGHT WHEN THEY EXPERIENCED A LOSS OF ENGINE POWER. THE PILOT WAS ATTEMPTING A FORCED LANDING ON A ROAD WHEN A CAR GOT IN THE WAY. THE PILOT THEN SET UP TO LAND IN A DESERT AREA ADJACENT TO THE ROAD. THE AIRCRAFT LANDED HARD AND SHEARED OFF THE LANDING GEAR. A FAA INSPECTOR FOUND THAT THE FUEL SELECTOR VALVE WAS POSITIONED TO A FUEL TANK THAT WAS EMPTY. THE OTHER THREE FUEL TANKS WERE FULL OF FUEL. THE FUEL PUMP FUNCTIONED NORMALLY WHEN ACTIVATED WITH AIRCRAFT BATTERY POWER, AND THE FUEL SELECTOR WAS POSITIONED TO A TANK CONTAINING FUEL. NO FUEL WAS FOUND IN THE FUEL LINES FROM THE FIREWALL TO THE FUEL PUMP. THE ENGINE WAS REMOVED FROM THE AIRCRAFT AND INSTALLED IN A TEST CELL. THE ENGINE STARTED WITHOUT HESITATION AND WAS EXERCISED THROUGHOUT ITS NORMAL POWER RANGE.
Probable cause
fuel starvation due to the pilot's failure to select a tank containing fuel.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX95LA070
- Event ID
- 20001207X02880
- Case number
- LAX95LA070
- 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 1995-01-02.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 017f5bac970bf47b7ec796181e36b9abc6ddcfabd322fe4f443904de3abefeb5; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:53:56.770Z.