SEA96LA085 · Aero Commander 200D
Aero Commander 200D · Accident: partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From 1S0 · Puyallup, WA to Norman Grier Field (S36)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA96LA085
- 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
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
- N2975T
- Operator
- Fletcher E. Newland · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 1S0 · Puyallup, WATo Norman Grier Field (S36), 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
- Approach · VFR pattern base
- 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
- Partial 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
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot stated that the aircraft's two main tanks (usable capacity 18.5 gallons each) were half full, with 'a couple of inches of fuel visible' before takeoff. He elected to make a 15-1/2 nautical mile flight without refueling. During the base-to-final turn at the destination, the aircraft's engine lost power. The pilot stated that he immediately switched from the left main tank to the right main tank, but that he 'did not activate the boost pump because it had flooded the engine in the past.' The engine did not restart, and the pilot decided he would not be able to reach the landing runway. He then performed a forced landing in a soft, uneven field. The airplane was substantially damaged during the forced landing. On-site examination revealed that the left main tank contained only residual fuel, the right main tank appeared empty, and both auxiliary tanks (usable capacity 18.5 gallons each) appeared about 1/4 full. During a postaccident engine test, the engine was successfully run for approximately five minutes by using residual fuel in the main tanks.
Probable cause
fuel starvation, due to the pilot's improper fuel management. The uneven terrain in the forced landing area was a related factor.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA96LA085
- Event ID
- 20001208X05674
- Case number
- SEA96LA085
- 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: f2657ffd55dce38d473c3286ebf7f7eaa0668c15add599e1918fca302208269a; retrieved 2026-09-22T22:33:50.453Z.