BFO93LA133 · Beatty GLASAIR SH-2 GLASAIR SH
Beatty GLASAIR SH-2 GLASAIR SH · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Cape May County Airport (WWD) to Cape May County Airport (WWD)
Event
- NTSB case
- BFO93LA133
- 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
Beatty GLASAIR SH-2 GLASAIR SH
- Aircraft type
- Beatty GLASAIR SH-2
- 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
- N522EB
- Operator
- Eugene J. Beatty · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Cape May County Airport (WWD)To Cape May County Airport (WWD)
- 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
- 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; Stall
- 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 › Starvation
- Pilot in command › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Airspeed, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Fuel tank selector position, improper
- Pilot in command › Stall, inadvertent
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Cape May, NJ, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
BEFORE FLIGHT, THE PILOT STARTED THE ENGINE BY USING THE AUXILIARY (AUX) FUEL TANK. HE ESTIMATED THERE WAS ABOUT 2 GAL OF FUEL IN THE AUX TANK AND 20 TO 22 GAL IN THE MAIN TANK. HE INTENDED TO MOVE THE FUEL SELECTOR TO THE MAIN TANK FOR TAKEOFF, BUT SAID HE WAS DISTRACTED WHEN ANOTHER AIRCRAFT TAXIED IN FRONT OF HIM, THOUGH HE WAS USING A CHECKLIST. SHORTLY AFTER LIFTOFF, AT ABOUT 75 TO 100 FT AGL, THE ENGINE LOST POWER. THE PILOT SAID HE MOVED THE FUEL SELECTOR TO THE MAIN TANK POSITION, BUT THE ENGINE DID NOT RESTART. THE PILOT STARTED TO MAKE AN EMERGENCY LANDING, BUT THE AIRPLANE STALLED AND IMPACTED THE GROUND IN A LEFT WING LOW ATTITUDE.
Probable cause
INADEQUATE PREFLIGHT BY THE PILOT BY NOT ASSURING THE FUEL SELECTOR WAS IN THE PROPER POSITION FOR TAKEOFF, WHICH RESULTED IN FUEL STARVATION AND SUBSEQUENT LOSS OF ENGINE POWER; AND FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO MAINTAIN SUFFICIENT AIRSPEED, WHICH RESULTED IN A STALL. THE PILOT'S DISTRACTION (DIVERTED ATTENTION) WAS A RELATED FACTOR.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record BFO93LA133
- Event ID
- 20001211X12809
- Case number
- BFO93LA133
- 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: 4002906f3a8a55e50f5e7c42daa4407baf4de5fbd80f466d41db65e946faafac; retrieved 2026-09-21T14:15:42.733Z.