FTW97LA028 · Cessna A185E
Cessna A185E · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Houston Southwest Airport (AXH) to Austin Bergstrom International Airport (AUS)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW97LA028
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Cessna A185E
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 185
- 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
- N185XX
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Houston Southwest Airport (AXH), Houston, TXTo Austin Bergstrom International Airport (AUS), Austin, TX
- 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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
- Lubricating system, oil filter/screen › Leak
- Lubricating system, oil seal › Twisted
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The engine lost power after the pilot reported to ATC that the engine oil pressure was dropping, subsequently reporting an overheating engine. The pilot requested vectors to the nearest airport; however, radio and radar contact were lost during the airplane's descend when 10 miles east of the airport. The aircraft touched down on a westerly heading in a field about 5 miles east of the airport. The pilot stated that the engine oil was changed by maintenance personnel at his hangar on the previous day and this was the first flight after completion of maintenance. An engine run up was not performed due to inclement weather on the day of the oil change. Examination of the engine revealed that an 'O' ring seal (P/N CI48100-8) installed on the cap of the oil filter was pinched during installation thus allowing the engine oil to leak during operation to the engine. According to the engine records, the engine was modified on December 5, 1995 with the installation of an 'Ultimate Engine Oil Filter' (Part number SA8922SW21) manufactured by Capehart Industries Inc., of Mena, Arkansas, under an FAA Supplemental Type Certificate dated July 21, 1994. The pilot purchased the airplane in April 1995.
Probable cause
The loss of engine power as result of an oil leak due to a pinched 'O' ring in the oil filter. Factors were the improper installation of the oil filter, and the lack of suitable terrain for the forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW97LA028
- Event ID
- 20001208X06893
- Case number
- FTW97LA028
- 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: 728423a523b45251e182694bcf8885c5c4bf719926578b265d8be574fce5910c; retrieved 2026-09-21T12:22:06.849Z.