FTW89LA160 · Cessna 210P
Cessna 210P · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) on approach
From Evansville Regional Airport (EVV) to Wiley Post Airport (PWA)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW89LA160
- 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 210P
- 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
- N732XW
- Operator
- Carl R. Messer · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Evansville Regional Airport (EVV), Evansville, INTo Wiley Post Airport (PWA)
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern final
- 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 (mechanical 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
- Fuel system, line › Loose
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DURING A VISUAL APCH TO LAND AT NIGHT, THE ENG LOST POWER AT ABOUT 400' AGL. THE PLT SAID THE LANDING LIGHTS PROVIDED SUFFICIENT LIGHTING TO LAND SAFELY, BUT HE WAS UNABLE TO SEE HAY BALES OR AN APCH LIGHT POLE IN THE EMERGENCY LANDING AREA IN TIME TO AVOID THEM. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE ACFT WAS DAMAGED BY A HAY BALE & THE LIGHT POLE. THE ACFT HAD BEEN SVCD WITH 87 GAL OF FUEL, WHICH WAS SUFFICIENT FOR THE 3 HR & 25 MIN FLT. HOWEVER, AN EXAM REVEALED THE FUEL TANKS WERE NEARLY EMPTY. A FURTHER EXAM REVEALED THAT THE FUEL LINE FROM THE FIREWALL TO THE ENG WAS ONLY FINGER TIGHT AT THE CONNECTION WITH THE ENG.
Probable cause
A LOOSE FUEL LINE CONNECTION, DUE TO INADEQUATE MAINTENANCE, WHICH RESULTED IN FUEL STARVATION. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: DARKNESS AND THE OBSTRUCTIONS (HAY BALE & APPROACH LIGHT POLE) IN THE EMERGENCY LANDING AREA.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW89LA160
- Event ID
- 20001213X29376
- Case number
- FTW89LA160
- 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 1989-09-07.
- API snapshot SHA-256: a4f5e26bfed35f4805b694f73f5d6ffe225a817a0e05dc656a872fca327ca3b5; retrieved 2026-09-23T07:11:16.642Z.