FTW01LA143 · Commander 114-B
Commander 114-B · Accident: total loss of engine power (mechanical failure) en route
From Murray-Calloway County Airport Kyle-Oakley Field (CEY) to Wiley Post Airport (PWA)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW01LA143
- 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
- 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
Commander 114-B
- Aircraft type
- Commander 114
- 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
- N114BW
- Operator
- Gary A. Gallo · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Murray-Calloway County Airport Kyle-Oakley Field (CEY), Murray, KYTo 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 (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
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flight had been airborne for three hours when the pilot heard a "loud bang" and the engine lost total power. He executed a forced landing to a field, during which the airplane contacted dirt mounds that were 4 feet high, before it came to a stop upright. Postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that fresh engine oil was adhering to the left side of the fuselage from the engine cowling extending back to the empennage. The oil dipstick was removed and indicated only 2 quarts (8 quart capacity). The oil was black and smelled as though it had been exposed to heat. The engine crankcase displayed a 2.5-inch diameter hole between the #5 and #6 cylinders. The engine was disassembled and it was noted that the connecting rod for the #6 cylinder had separated from its piston and the crankshaft. The #6 connecting rod journal displayed evidence of thermal damage and metal transfer. Metallurgical examination of the #6 connecting rod end cap and bolt revealed fractures indicative of overstress at extreme temperatures. Additionally, the rod end cap bearing surface displayed fretting and metal transfer. No other anomalies with the engine were noted.
Probable cause
the failure of the #6 cylinder's connecting rod, which resulted in a complete loss of engine power. A contributing factor to the accident was the lack of suitable terrain for the forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW01LA143
- Event ID
- 20010618X01189
- Case number
- FTW01LA143
- 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: fa9e22753a3aa9f360392113f9ab5fd142bbaa9f7d95fcf26de226c42631197a; retrieved 2026-09-21T19:55:52.734Z.