LAX89LA223 · Cessna T210N
Cessna T210N · Accident: airframe, component or system failure en route
From Eastern Sierra Regional Airport (BIH) to Spalding Airport (1Q2)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX89LA223
- 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 T210N
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 210
- 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
- N4857C
- Operator
- William C. Ealy · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Eastern Sierra Regional Airport (BIH), Bishop, CATo Spalding Airport (1Q2), Susanville, CA
- 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
- Airframe, component or system failure
- 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
- 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 › Starvation
- Pilot in command › Diverted attention
- Pilot in command › Emergency procedure, improper
- Pilot in command › Fuel tank selector position, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
ON A PREVIOUS FLT, THE ACFT'S ELEC SYS OVERHEATED & FAILED. THE PLT DIVERTED TO BISHOP, CA, WHERE IT WAS REPAIRED. APRX 1 HR AFTER TAKING OFF ON THE NEXT FLT, THE ALTERNATOR CIRCUIT BREAKER 'POPPED.' THE PLT TURNED OFF THE ELEC MASTER SW & DECIDED TO CONT TO THE DESTN. HOWEVER, A SHORT TIME LATER, THE ENG BEGAN TO SURGE & SUBSEQUENTLY LOST POWER. THE PLT INITIATED EMERG PROCEDURES, BUT DID NOT RECALL SWITCHING THE FUEL SELECTOR. HE MNVRD THE ACFT TO LAND AT A NEARBY ARPT, BUT AFTER EXTENDING THE GEAR TO LAND, HE REALIZED THE ACFT WOULD NOT REACH THE RWY. BEFORE MAKING AN OFF-ARPT LANDING, HE SAW TRANSMISSION LINES AHEAD, BUT HAD INSUFFICIENT SPEED TO FLY OVER THEM. WHILE CROSSING UNDER THE WIRES TO LAND, THE ACFT HIT THE GND & WAS DMGD. AN EXAM REVEALED THE FUEL SELECTOR WAS PSND TO THE LEFT TANK, WHICH CONTAINED ONLY OUNCES OF FUEL. THE RGT TANK HAD AN ESTIMATED 15 TO 20 GAL OF FUEL REMAINING. WHEN CHECKED, THE ALTERNATOR CIRCUIT FAILED TO SUSTAIN AN ELEC LOAD AT ITS RATED CAPACITY.
Probable cause
FUEL STARVATION, AFTER THE PILOT DIVERTED HIS ATTENTION TO AN ELECTRICAL PROBLEM, AND HIS FAILURE TO REPOSITION THE FUEL SELECTOR SWITCH, EITHER BEFORE THE ENGINE LOST POWER OR DURING EMERGENCY PROCEDURES. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: THE TRIPPED ALTERNATOR CIRCUIT BREAKER, AND HIGH OBSTRUCTIONS IN THE EMERGENCY LANDING AREA.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX89LA223
- Event ID
- 20001213X28605
- Case number
- LAX89LA223
- 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: 91e3bef3fb78caf98fe8ba386341a2ffe46c474438b44a5f77c4c7da49686ef8; retrieved 2026-09-21T15:54:10.064Z.