CHI82DA246 · Republic RC-3
Republic RC-3 · Accident: loss of engine power en route
From Harbor Springs, MI to Troy, MI
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI82DA246
- 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
Republic RC-3
- Aircraft type
- Republic RC-3
- 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
- N6444K
- Operator
- William R. Aikens · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Harbor Springs, MITo Troy, MI
- 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
- 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
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Saginaw, MI, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE PILOT STATED THAT HE TOOK OFF WITH 35 GAL OF FUEL ABOARD. AFTER ABOUT 128 NAUTICAL MILES, THE ENGINE LOST POWER. WHILE LANDING IN A MUDDY CORN FIELD WITH THE GEAR RETRACTED, THE AIRCRAFT SLID A SHORT DISTANCE THEN NOSED OVER. ONE OF THE FIRST PERSONS TO ARRIVE AT THE SCENE STATED THAT HE COULD NOT RECALL SMELLING FUEL. THE NEXT MORNING (AFTER THE AIRCRAFT WAS INVERTED ALL NIGHT), HE ARRIVED AT THE SCENE AND NOTED THAT THE FUEL CAP WAS DANGLING BY ITS CHAIN, BUT HE DID NOT RECALL THE CAP DANGLING ON THE NIGHT BEFORE. IT WAS NOTED THAT THE AIRCRAFT HAD BEEN BROKEN INTO OVER NIGHT AND SEVERAL ARTICLES HAD BEEN REMOVED. AN INSPECTION AND OPERATIONAL CHECK OF THE ENGINE REVEALED NO PREIMPACT FAILURES.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI82DA246
- Event ID
- 20020917X02980
- Case number
- CHI82DA246
- 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: 36c6c1b7347b4dbc9deaba8335e2620377ae2fa1a455fe825e354ca022e57a69; retrieved 2026-09-24T02:25:00.249Z.