IAD00LA085 · Cessna 182Q
Cessna 182Q · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Washington Manassas Harry P. Davis Field (HEF) to Mount Sterling Montgomery County Airport (IOB)
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD00LA085
- 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 182Q
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 182
- 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
- N94326
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Washington Manassas Harry P. Davis Field (HEF), Manassas, VATo Mount Sterling Montgomery County Airport (IOB), Owingsville, KY
- 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 contamination
- 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 › Contamination, water
- Fuel system, cap › Inoperative
- Pilot in command › Maintenance, not obtained/maintained
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported to ATC that the airplane was low on fuel and the engine was sputtering. Witnesses said the airplane struck terrain and nosed over adjacent to an Interstate highway. During recovery of the airplane, an FAA inspector noted that water appeared to drain from the left fuel tank. Subsequent examination of the airplane revealed the airplane's fuel system was not compromised, and about 9 gallons of fuel was drained from the airplane. Water was found throughout the fuel system. The carburetor contained approximately 3 ounces of water. Examination of the right fuel cap revealed the cap was unsecured and unserviceable. The cap was removed and rust was observed around the inside of the fuel port. The pilot/owner had previously declined a repair to the cap due to cost. Between the times the repair was declined, and the pilot departed on the accident flight, approximately 14 inches of rain fell on the airplane. Examination of the airplane's engine revealed no mechanical deficiencies. The airplane's most recent annual inspection was performed 13 months prior to the accident. The pilot's most recent medical certificate was issued 4 years prior to the accident and his most recent biennial flight review was completed 3 years prior to the accident. According to the fixed base operator from where the airplane departed, "It was a terrible looking airplane. There was excessive fuel staining down the right side. The cap had no O-ring or gasket and we've had a lot of rain. He didn't want the work. The only work we did was to service his oxygen tank."
Probable cause
A loss of engine power due to water contamination of the fuel. Also causal in the accident was the pilot/owner's failure to repair the inoperative fuel cap.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD00LA085
- Event ID
- 20001212X21995
- Case number
- IAD00LA085
- 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, coordinates. 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: 151edae0c9688bda433b8c88084217d6d7bdfd4fef9cb26f65248157af25367d; retrieved 2026-09-21T20:04:33.245Z.