FTW89FA155 · Piper PA-28R-180
Business Aircraft Piper PA-28R-180 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From OF9 · Tishomingo, OK to Wiley Post Airport (PWA)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW89FA155
- 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
Piper PA-28R-180
- 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
- N7593J
- Operator
- Business Aircraft
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From OF9 · Tishomingo, OKTo Wiley Post Airport (PWA), Oklahoma City, OK
- 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 starvation; 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Pilot in command › Emergency procedure, not followed
- Pilot in command › Fuel tank selector position, improper
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, improper
- Pilot in command › Procedures/directives, not understood
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE ACFT HAD BEEN REFUELED AT A NRBY ARPT BEFORE THIS PLT STARTED HIS FLT. HE TOOK OFF & FLEW THE ACFT FROM OKLAHOMA CITY TO TISHOMINGO, OK, WITH THE FUEL SELECTOR PSND TO THE RIGHT TANK (THE TANK THAT WAS LAST USED BY THE PREVIOUS PLT).ON THE RTRN FLT TO OKLAHOMA CITY AT NIGHT, THE PLT'S FATHER NOTICED THE RIGHT GAGE INDCD EMPTY WHILE THE LEFT INDCD FULL. PLT COULD NOT FIND THE FUEL SELECTOR VALVE & REQUESTED HELP FROM ARTCC. BEFORE THEY COULD HELP HIM, THE ENG LOST POWER. THERE HAPPENED TO BE A PLT AT ARTCC, WHO WAS FAMILIAR WITH THE PA-28. BY THE TIME HE WAS FOUND & INFO WAS PASSED TO THE PLT OF N7593J, THE ACFT HAD NRLY DSCNDD TO THE GROUND. AS THE PLT WAS REACHING FOR THE FUEL SELECTOR, THE ACFT HIT TREES & CRASHED. LATER, THE PLT SAID HE HAD NEVER OPERD THE LANDING GEAR OR FUEL SELECTOR DRG HIS CHECKOUT IN THE AIRCRAFT. HE THOUGHT THE FUEL SELECTOR WAS ON THE FLOOR, BETWEEN THE SEATS, BUT IT WAS LOCATED ON THE LEFT WALL OF THE COCKPIT, NEAR THE PLT'S LEFT KNEE. THE FUEL SELECTOR WAS FOUND PSND TO THE EMPTY RIGHT TANK.
Probable cause
IMPROPER PLANNING/DECISION BY THE PILOT, HIS LACK OF UNDERSTANDING OF THE PROCEDURES FOR OPERATING THE AIRCRAFT, HIS IMPROPER USE OF THE FUEL SELECTOR IN MANAGING HIS FUEL SUPPLY, FUEL STARVATION, AND THE PILOT'S FAILURE TO KNOW AND FOLLOW THE EMERGENCY PROCEDURES WHEN THE ENGINE LOST POWER. CONTRIBUTING FACTORS WERE: INADEQUATE TRANSITION TRAINING PROVIDED BY THE INSTRUCTOR PILOT, THE PILOT'S LACK OF FAMILIARITY WITH THE AIRCRAFT, THE DARK NIGHT, AND THE TREES.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW89FA155
- Event ID
- 20001213X29118
- Case number
- FTW89FA155
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1989-08-29.
- API snapshot SHA-256: e28fa57632e331839944c396e30c7f7f959f9b4d5f30374d3041ff430f50bd97; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:10:39.777Z.