LAX05CA129 · Beech D50C
Beech D50C · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Montague-Yreka Rohrer Field (1O5) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX05CA129
- 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
Beech D50C
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 50
- 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
- N50G
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Montague-Yreka Rohrer Field (1O5), Montague, CATo not recorded
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- 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
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Pilot in command › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
- Pilot in command › Directional control, not maintained
- Pilot in command › Fuel supply, not verified
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Following a loss of engine power from the right engine during takeoff, the airplane veered to the right of the runway and collided with a hangar. The pilot reported that he had found a leak in a fuel line fitting on the right engine during the flight prior to the accident. He fixed the leak by tightening the fitting; however, he had not determined how much fuel remained in the right main fuel tank after the repair or during preflight for the accident flight. The pilot said the start, taxi, and run-up were normal on both engines. Just after liftoff, the airplane yawed to the right. Despite full left rudder and aileron input, the pilot could not prevent the airplane from veering off the runway and colliding with a hangar. An examination of the airplane after the accident determined that the fuel system for the right wing was still intact, and that there were no leaks. The right auxiliary fuel tank was still full of fuel. No fuel was found in the right main fuel tank or in any of the fuel lines leading to the right engine.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate aircraft preflight and failure to verify that an adequate fuel supply was in the right main tank prior to flight, resulting in a fuel starvation induced loss of engine power in the right engine. Also causal was the pilot's failure to maintain directional control following the loss of engine power.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX05CA129
- Event ID
- 20050503X00547
- Case number
- LAX05CA129
- 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: 1ef43514396a59c10323094eab013069910b396d3283e9127b41a6ab7e6f0338; retrieved 2026-09-21T19:03:14.214Z.