CHI05LA109 · Piper PA-31T
Piper PA-31T · Accident: airframe, component or system failure on approach
From Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport (BJC) to Bismarck Municipal Airport (BIS)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's departure or destination. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI05LA109
- 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
Piper PA-31T
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-31
- 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
- N2338V
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route Possible conflict
- From Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport (BJC), Denver, COTo Bismarck Municipal Airport (BIS), Bismark, ND
- 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
- 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
- Airframe, component or system 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
- Fluid, hydraulic › Loss, partial
- Hydraulic system, line › Ruptured
- Pilot in command › Gear extension, not possible
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was substantially damaged during an emergency landing when the landing gear did not extend properly. The pilot noted that when he attempted to lower the landing gear on approach to the intended destination nothing happened. He elected to divert to an airport with additional capabilities and assistance available. The pilot stated that he executed the emergency gear extension procedure, however, this procedure was not successful. The left main landing gear appeared to be fully extended, the nose landing gear was in a "dragging" condition, and the right main landing gear was retracted when observed by the tower controller prior to landing. The pilot noted that the red gear unlocked indicator light was illuminated and the green landing gear down/locked indicators were not illuminated. Since no further options were available to extend the gear, the pilot executed an emergency landing. The airplane touched down on the left main wheel which did not collapse initially. The right wing subsequently dropped and contacted the runway. The pilot applied left wheel brakes, however, the airplane departed the right side of the runway pavement and came to rest in the grass. The left main landing gear collapsed and a runway light was damaged in the process. The post-accident inspection revealed that a hydraulic powerpak drain line (Piper part number 46138-00) was ruptured. The drain line was located in the nose section of the airplane, forward of the cabin pressure bulkhead. The rupture was approximately one-half inch long. Hydraulic fluid was observed in the vicinity of the line rupture. The hydraulic reservoir was empty.
Probable cause
Rupture of the hydraulic powerpak drain line which resulted in a loss of hydraulic fluid and the inability to properly lower the landing gear despite the pilot's execution of the emergency extension procedures. A contributing factor was the runway light struck during the emergency landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI05LA109
- Event ID
- 20050506X00570
- Case number
- CHI05LA109
- 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 2005-05-04.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 0507a60f138be7c793545f8fab21b3e98a67fd525281d399e920cdaf47b3c865; retrieved 2026-09-22T05:58:21.912Z.