Aspen Airways Convair 580 accident
Convair 580 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Denver International Airport (DEN) to Durango La Plata County Airport (DRO)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN89FA064
- 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
- Airline
- 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
Convair 580
- Aircraft type
- Convair 580
- 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
- N73160
- Operator
- Aspen Airways
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Denver International Airport (DEN), Denver, COTo Durango La Plata County Airport (DRO), Durango, CO
- 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 121: Air Carrier
- 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)
- 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 › Checklist, not followed
- Pilot in command › Emergency procedure, improper
- Pilot in command › Fuel supply, inadvertent deactivation
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DRG FLT, CREW SHTDN RGT ENG WHEN WARNING LGT FOR GEARBOX OIL PRES ILLUMINATED & PRES WAS NOTED BLO MIN LMT OF 130 PSI. SHORTLY AFTER SECURING RGT ENG, L ENG LOST PWR. (FUEL TANK SHUTOFF VLV SWS & FUEL X-FEED VLV SW WERE LCTD NR EACH OTR.) ATMTS TO RESTART L ENG WERE UNSUCCESSFUL. WITH LACK OF AC ELEC PWR, CAPT COULD NOT UNFEATHER RGT ENG FOR RESTART. DRG EMERG LNDG, ACFT WAS DMGD ON UNEVEN TRRN. OPNL CHECK OF RGT ENG (AT GND LVL) REVEALED NO MALFUNCTION THAT WOULD HAVE PREVENTED NML OPN. EXAM OF L ENG REVEALED TURBINE SECTION HAD OVERHEATED & TURBINE BLADES HAD SEVERE HEAT DMG. CAPT SAIDTHAT WHEN HE TRIED TO RESTART L ENG, FUEL VLVS WERE IN NORMAL PSN & PWR LEVER WAS 1' ABV IDLE. HE RECALLED AN ENG RPM OF8000, BUT DIDN'T RECALL IF HE HAD USED FEATHER BUTTON TO REDUCE RPM TO 3000 (AS DRCTD BY CHECKLIST). HE VERIFIED FUEL SWS WERE 'ON' & HE TRIED TO X-FEED FUEL (IN EVENT OF BLOCKAGE). X-FEEDING OF FUEL WAS NOT PART OF RESTART PROC. FLT MAN-UAL CAUTIONED ABT IMPORTANCE OF REDUCING PWR TO FLT IDLE, TO DECREASE FUEL FLOW TO ENG & MINIMIZE POSSIBLE OVERHEATING.
Probable cause
INADVERTENT DEACTIVATION OF FUEL TO THE LEFT ENGINE AS THE PILOT WAS MAKING A PRECAUTIONARY SHUTDOWN OF THE RIGHT ENGINE, AND HIS FAILURE TO FOLLOW THE EMERGENCY CHECKLIST PROCEDURE. RELATED FACTORS WERE: LOW GEARBOX OIL PRESSURE (AT FLIGHT ALTITUDE), AND UNEVEN TERRAIN THAT WAS ENCOUNTERED DURING THE EMERGENCY LANDING.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN89FA064
- Event ID
- 20001213X27562
- Case number
- DEN89FA064
- 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: 8826524664333cbbed8d15db00f4cbb264ae9174a8219d1e6e5fa31047a2cec2; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:14:43.652Z.