ATL90LA013 · Cessna 152
Cessna 152 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Pitt-Greenville Airport (PGV) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL90LA013
- 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 152
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 152
- 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
- N67318
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Pitt-Greenville Airport (PGV), Greenville, NCTo not recorded
- 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 · descent
- 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 exhaustion
- 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 › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Communications equipment, improper use of
- Pilot in command › Preflight planning/preparation, inadequate
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Kinston, NC, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
PILOT DEPARTED WITH 2 TO 3 INCHES OF FUEL IN EACH TANK FOR THE 21.5 MI FLIGHT TO OBTAIN FUEL. UPON ARRIVAL NEAR DESTINATION, CONTACT COULD NOT BE MADE WITH THE CONTROL TOWER. WHILE ATTEMPTING TO MAKE CONTACT WITH THE TOWER HE REALIZED HE NOW HAD A VERY LOW FUEL STATE. THE ENGINE LOST POWER AND QUIT. A FORCED LANDING WAS MADE IN A FIELD AND THE AIRPLANE NOSED OVER ON ROLLOUT. NO FUEL WAS FOUND IN THE AIRPLANE AFTER THE ACCIDENT, AND THE COMMUNICATION RADIOS WERE FOUND IN THE OFF POSITION.
Probable cause
THE PILOT'S DECISION TO DEPART FOR HIS DESTINATION AIRPORT WITH LESS THAN REQUIRED FUEL, AND HIS IMPROPER USE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS RADIO WHICH RESULTED IN HIS CIRCLING THE AIRPORT AND EXHAUSTING ALL FUEL.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL90LA013
- Event ID
- 20001213X29534
- Case number
- ATL90LA013
- 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: 335c3bce85d5988942ad84d9475acb11cd8d7ec5d4b5360ff978ee264974b95d; retrieved 2026-09-22T00:00:33.416Z.