NYC01FA122 · Cessna U206E
Cessna U206E · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Eastern WV Regional Airport/Shepherd Field (MRB) to Hickory Regional Airport (HKY)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC01FA122
- 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
- Unknown
- 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 U206E
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 206
- 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
- N948CG
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Eastern WV Regional Airport/Shepherd Field (MRB), Martinsburg, WVTo Hickory Regional Airport (HKY), Hickory, NC
- 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 (mechanical failure)
- 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
- Engine assembly, piston › Undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was in cruise flight at 8,000 feet in visual flight rules conditions, when the pilot reported he experienced a total loss of engine power. At that time, the airplane was about 4 miles from an airport with a 2,920-foot long, asphalt runway. The air traffic controller initially cleared the airplane to an airport more than 20 miles from it's position and then directed the airplane to an airport located on the other side of a ridgeline, about 12 miles away. After the pilot reported he could not reach the airport, the controller then directed the airplane to the airport with the 2,920-foot long runway; however the airplane struck the top of a residence and a tree, before it came to rest inverted in a field, approximately 1.5 miles east of the runway. Streaks of oil were present on the bottom of the fuselage and small holes were observed on the top portion of the engine crankcase near the number 5 cylinder. Examination of the engine revealed that the number 5 piston was separated from it's respective connecting rod. The bottom portion of the number 5 piston was broken into several small pieces, which were observed in the engine. Examination of the intact fracture surfaces did not reveal any evidence of fatigue or preexisting cracks; however is was noted that only 75 percent of the number 5 piston boss area, and less then 25 percent of the number 5 piston skirt below the upper oil control ring was recovered. The engine had been operated for about 70 hours since it was rebuilt by it's manufacturer and was installed in the accident airplane, about 11 months prior to the accident.
Probable cause
A loss of engine power due to a failure of the number 5 piston for undetermined reasons. A factor in this accident was the inadequate emergency handling provided by the air route traffic controller.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC01FA122
- Event ID
- 20010529X01022
- Case number
- NYC01FA122
- 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, coordinates. 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: 35fe87031efc47e747facfd521605b4b1d71ce9b5ad346c6cd61156b39a1f170; retrieved 2026-09-20T20:33:38.234Z.