ATL94LA034 · Piper PA-28-181
Piper PA-28-181 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport (BWI) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL94LA034
- 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
Piper PA-28-181
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N4320X
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport (BWI), Baltimore, MDTo not recorded
- 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
- Pilot in command › Fuel consumption calculations, inadequate
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE AIRCRAFT WAS ON APPROACH FOR GREENVILLE SPARTANBURG AIRPORT WHEN THE PILOT ADVISED AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL THAT HE HAD TWENTY MINUTES OF FUEL LEFT. ATC OFFERED VECTORS TO ANOTHER AIRPORT WHICH WAS THREE MILES FROM HIS POSITION, BUT THE PILOT DECLINED. SHORTLY AFTER, THE PILOT REQUESTED A DIVERSION TO THE ALTERNATE AIRPORT , WHICH ATC APPROVED. APPROXIMATELY TWO MILES FROM THE ALTERNATE AIRPORT, THE PILOT REPORTED THAT HE HAD LOST ENGINE POWER AND WOULD HAVE TO PERFORM AN EMERGENCY LANDING. ATC ADVISED THE PILOT OF A HIGHWAY LESS THAN ONE MILE FROM HIS POSITION. DURING THE EMERGENCY APPROACH, THE PILOT ATTEMPTED A 180 DEGREE TURN TO AVOID ONCOMING AUTOMOTIVE TRAFFIC AND THE AIRPLANE IMPACTED TREES OFF OF THE HIGHWAY. THE PILOT REPORTED CALCULATING TWENTY MINUTES OF RESERVE FUEL DURING PREFLIGHT PLANNING. HE STATED THAT DURING THE FLIGHT, HE OBSERVED THAT HIS ACTUAL TIME ENROUTE WAS LESS THAN HE HAD PLANNED, AND THOUGHT HE WOULD HAVE ENOUGH FUEL FOR THE FLIGHT. HE STATED THAT HE FAILED TO TAKE INTO ACCOUNT HIS USE OF 75% POWER DURING THE FLIGHT INSTEAD OF 65% HE HAD USED FOR PREFLIGHT PLANNING, AND THE ADDITIONAL FUEL BURN AS A RESULT.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S INADEQUATE IN-FLIGHT PLANNING IN DETERMINING FUEL REQUIREMENTS FOR THE FLIGHT.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL94LA034
- Event ID
- 20001211X13825
- Case number
- ATL94LA034
- 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: 6105379c11296d2aa93a05abbaf01df8746174e3dddf468612363c6e047c7c6f; retrieved 2026-09-21T22:44:14.077Z.