FTW02LA226 · Cessna 150L
Cessna 150L · Accident: loss of engine power during an emergency descent
From 5R5 · Wharton, TX to 21T · Pearland, TX
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW02LA226
- 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
Cessna 150L
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 150
- 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
- N10935
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From 5R5 · Wharton, TXTo 21T · Pearland, TX
- 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
- Emergency 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
- Loss of engine power
- 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 from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
During the cross-country flight, the pilot performed a forced landing following a loss of engine power. During the landing roll, the nose landing gear collapse in the rough terrain. Examination revealed there was fuel in both fuel tanks, and the fuel was blue in color with no visual evidence of debris or contamination. The fuel selector was found in the "ON" position. When the crankshaft was rotated, there was engine continuity to the accessory case, thumb compression on each cylinder, and operation of the magneto impulse coupling. The spark plugs exhibited moderate wear. Continuity was confirmed for the throttle and mixture cables from the cockpit to the carburetor. The carburetor bowl had impact damage. The carburetor accelerator pump operated. No debris was found on the fuel screens for the gascolator or the carburetor. The reason for the loss of engine power could not be determined.
Probable cause
The loss of engine power for an undetermined reason. A contributing factor was the lack of suitable terrain for the forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW02LA226
- Event ID
- 20020808X01346
- Case number
- FTW02LA226
- 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, coordinates. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2002-08-04.
- API snapshot SHA-256: ae9c6c7f2cd5e8b0f35ffb1c2f1dd357588064475760bf01c0f12e9e2a1a8b03; retrieved 2026-09-21T19:39:02.157Z.