Amigo Aviation Cessna 401A accident
Cessna 401A · Accident: loss of engine power on approach
From Corpus Christi International Airport (CRP) to William P. Hobby Airport (HOU)
Event
- NTSB case
- DFW05LA165
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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 401A
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 401
- 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
- N7KF
- Operator
- Amigo Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Corpus Christi International Airport (CRP), Corpus Christi, TXTo William P. Hobby Airport (HOU), Houston, 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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 final
- 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
- 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
- All engines
- Fluid, fuel › Starvation
- Pilot in command › Fuel management, 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 1,608-hour commercial pilot departed on a scheduled cargo flight. Prior to departure, he preformed a preflight inspection and visually verified all five fuel tanks were full. The flight took approximately 1 hour for the 162 nautical mile cross-country flight. Prior to his return flight, he again checked the fuel and oil. He noted that, he had 3 hours of fuel on board. About 15 minutes after departure, the pilot switched to the auxiliary tanks. The pilot stated, "after 10-15 minutes on taking fuel from the auxiliary tanks, I switched to the right locker tank." Shortly thereafter, air traffic control instructed him to start a descent, and he selected the main fuel tanks. During the approach, the right engine began to "sputter". As the pilot was going through the engine failure checklist, the left engine "started sputtering." The pilot switched the auxiliary fuel pumps to high; then changed from the main tanks to the auxiliary fuel tanks. The airplane landed short of runway 12R. Inspection of the aircraft revealed, both auxiliary fuel tanks were "dry", the right main fuel tank contained approximately 3-inches of fuel, and the left main tank was "dry", but had been breached during the landing. The right wing locker fuel tank was full of fuel, and the transfer switch was in the off position. The left fuel selector was found in the left auxiliary position and the right fuel selector was found in the right auxiliary position. The main fuel line on the right engine had no fuel in it, and the line to the fuel manifold valve was empty as well. The left main fuel line had a "couple teaspoons" of fuel in it, and the fuel line to the left fuel manifold valve was absent of fuel.
Probable cause
The loss of engine power to both engines due to fuel starvation as a result of the pilot's improper fuel management. 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 DFW05LA165
- Event ID
- 20050622X00844
- Case number
- DFW05LA165
- 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: b2be374d78ef7ecbf28f66bfdb9e28d305228453e6ee3aaf05c550986097046f; retrieved 2026-09-18T15:01:12.799Z.