NYC04CA108 · Andrews Zenith Tri-Z
Andrews Zenith Tri-Z · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From Brokenstraw Airport (P15) to Kennedy, NY (no airport)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC04CA108
- 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
Andrews Zenith Tri-Z
- Aircraft type
- Andrews ZENITH TRI-Z
- 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
- N569Z
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Brokenstraw Airport (P15), Pittsfield, PATo Kennedy, NY (no airport)
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern turn to base
- 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 starvation; Tree(s)
- 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
- Pilot in command › Fuel tank selector position, improper
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot performed a touch and go, and as he made a right turn in the traffic pattern, he observed fuel venting from the right wing of the airplane. He then switched the fuel tank selector position from the left tank to the right tank, to burn off fuel from that tank. He flew the downwind leg of the traffic pattern, and as he turned onto the base leg, the engine lost power. The pilot then set up for a forced landing, during which the airplane impacted trees. The pilot stated that when he switched the fuel selector from the left tank to the right tank position, he did not secure the selector into the right tank detent, effectively turning the fuel "off." He reported the accident could be attributed to "pilot error."
Probable cause
The pilot's improper fuel tank selector position which resulted in a loss of engine power due to fuel starvation.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC04CA108
- Event ID
- 20040430X00536
- Case number
- NYC04CA108
- 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: a92496128b7bd041f523404b6e68b5ff873c41ba709376eed5293a0d2d2002b8; retrieved 2026-09-21T09:18:16.048Z.