FTW97LA268 · Cessna 152
National Aviation Services Cessna 152 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Waco Regional Airport (ACT) to Angelina County Airport (LFK)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW97LA268
- 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 152
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 152
- 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
- N5238H
- Operator
- National Aviation Services
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Waco Regional Airport (ACT), Waco, TXTo Angelina County Airport (LFK), 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
- 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 exhaustion; Tree(s)
- 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 › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Became lost/disoriented, inadvertent
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
While on a solo cross country flight from Waco, Texas, to the Angelina Airport near Lufkin, Texas, the student pilot became disoriented. She located and identified the town of Buffalo, confirmed fuel on board, and continued east towards Lufkin. As she neared Lufkin, she once again became disoriented. She flew past the Angelina Airport; however, she did not see it. She also did not use the Lufkin VORTAC to help locate the airport. The engine lost power approximately 16 nautical miles northeast of the Angelina Airport, about 3 hours and 26 minutes after takeoff. During a forced landing to a small field, the aircraft struck some trees, and came to a stop on its nose. Examination of the aircraft's fuel system revealed no evidence of fuel. The pilot reported that she 'ran out of fuel.' A test run of the engine was accomplished on July 17, 1997. With the throttle full open, the indicated rpm was 2,350. A magneto check was performed, and the rpm drop on both the left and right magnetos was 75 rpm.
Probable cause
The loss of engine power due to fuel exhaustion, which resulted from the student pilot becoming disoriented. A factor was the lack of suitable terrain for the forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW97LA268
- Event ID
- 20001208X08381
- Case number
- FTW97LA268
- 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: 6865976c744d1ce7bb37fd1d2dc69696a0fec1c890a3b0bb0cc7112e8028feca; retrieved 2026-09-22T19:08:50.794Z.