ATL91FA148 · Cessna 401
Cessna 401 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From 57A · Rutherfordton, NC to RVQ · Salisbury, NC
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL91FA148
- 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
- 1 · 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 401
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 401
- 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
- N3298Q
- Operator
- Fisher, Hyman S · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 57A · Rutherfordton, NCTo RVQ · Salisbury, NC
- 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
- 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 › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Fuel supply, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ACCIDENT OCCURRED DURING THE PILOT'S SECOND ATTEMPT TO FLY TO HIS DESTINATION. ACCORDING TO AIRPORT PERSONNEL, HE DID NOT REFUEL THE AIRPLANE AFTER HE RETURNED FROM THE FIRST ATTEMPT. HE HAD ONLOADED 43.6 GALLONS OF FUEL BEFORE DEPARTING ON THE FIRST FLIGHT. AFTER DEPARTING RUTHERFORDTON ON THE SECOND FLIGHT, THE AIRPLANE WAS OBSERVED ABOUT 400 FEET ABOVE THE GROUND AND 4 MILES NORTH OF MONROE. ONE WITNESS REPORTED THAT THE RIGHT ENGINE WAS SPUTTERING AS IT FLEW OVERHEAD; SECONDS LATER, THE AIRPLANE CRASHED INTO A WOODED AREA. A WRECKAGE EXAMINATION DISCLOSED THAT THE FUEL SYSTEM WAS EMPTY. NO FUEL WAS FOUND IN THE LEFT ENGINE FUEL FLOW DIVIDER. AIRPORT PERSONNEL ALSO REPORTED THE PILOT WAS NOT KNOWLEDGEABLE OF THE AIRCRAFT FUEL SYSTEM. ACCORDING TO THE OWNER'S MANUAL, THE FUEL CONSUMPTION RATE FOR CRUISE AT 75% POWER WAS ABOUT 16 GALLONS PER HOUR PER ENGINE. THE PILOT HAD OPERATED THE ENGINES APPROXIMATELY 2 HOURS 10 MINUTES BEFORE THEY LOST POWER.
Probable cause
INADEQUATE PREFLIGHT BY THE PILOT, WHICH RESULTED IN FUEL EXHAUSTION, DUE TO AN INADEQUATE SUPPLY OF FUEL. THE PILOT'S LACK OF FAMILIARITY WITH THE AIRCRAFT FUEL SYSTEM WAS A RELATED FACTOR.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL91FA148
- Event ID
- 20001212X17762
- Case number
- ATL91FA148
- 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: 411030011b86793dffb834d0de3d186912ca5c8d5d5d5ad95731fe5ddd4eb179; retrieved 2026-09-21T01:39:47.309Z.