LAX97LA029 · Cessna 310H
Cessna 310H · Accident: partial loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Show Low Regional Airport (SOW) to Chandler Municipal Airport (CHD)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX97LA029
- 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 310H
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 310
- 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
- N1039Q
- Operator
- Martin J. Stuart · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Show Low Regional Airport (SOW), Show Low, AZTo Chandler Municipal Airport (CHD), Chandler, AZ
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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 contamination
- 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
- Fluid, fuel › Contamination, water
- Fuel system, cap › Deteriorated
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, annual inspection, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The aircraft had been parked on the ramp for 7 days prior to the accident flight because of poor weather, which included snow, rain, and below freezing temperatures. The fuel tanks were partially filled with fuel. The pilot reported that no moisture was observed during the preflight of the aircraft, and that the engine run-up was normal. After departure and landing gear retraction, the right engine lost power. The pilot then pushed all engine power controls forward, and verified that the engine fuel boost pumps were on and the landing gear retracted prior to making an off-airport forced landing. According to the pilot's written statement, the engine failure occurred after lift-off and prior to obtaining Vyse. Subsequent examination of the four fuel filler cap O-rings revealed signs of deterioration and cracking, which was sufficient to allow water to enter the fuel tanks. The outside air temperature was below freezing the night prior to and the morning of the accident. The aircraft had completed an annual inspection 3 months and 15 hours prior to the accident flight. The right engine was examined following aircraft recovery with no discrepancies noted.
Probable cause
water/ice contamination in the fuel system and/or fuel filters due to failure of the maintenance facility that performed the annual inspection to identify and replace four cracked and deteriorated fuel filler cap O-rings. A factor in this accident was the pilot's failure to identify, and recognize the contamination hazard with, the cracked and deteriorated fuel filler cap O-rings during the preflight of the aircraft.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX97LA029
- Event ID
- 20001208X06936
- Case number
- LAX97LA029
- 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: 280beafcc53f15e6f0a441f9ff0efbfb2c84f255c52947255789faade5742f3f; retrieved 2026-09-22T20:51:00.860Z.