DEN05LA123 · Forbes Rutan Long EZE
Forbes Rutan Long EZE · Accident: airframe, component or system failure on approach
From Henderson Executive Airport (HND) to Albuquerque International Sunport (ABQ)
Event
- NTSB case
- DEN05LA123
- 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
Forbes Rutan Long EZE
- Aircraft type
- Forbes RUTAN LONG EZE
- 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
- N16WF
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Henderson Executive Airport (HND), Las Vegas, NVTo Albuquerque International Sunport (ABQ), Albequerque, NM
- 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 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
- 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
- Electrical system, electric relay › Shorted
- Electrical system, fuse › Open
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
On final approach to the runway, the pilot lowered the landing gear and visually inspected it through the sight glass to make sure it was down and locked. About 20 seconds later, there was a sudden and total electrical failure and the engine lost power. The pilot switched from the MAIN battery to the AUX battery in an attempt to restore electrical and engine power, but left it selected for only about 2 to 3 seconds. He then switched back to the MAIN battery and concentrated on the emergency forced landing. He could not recall if the propeller was windmilling at the time (a windmilling propeller would be necessary to start the engine using AUX battery power). The pilot made a forced landing on an access road and collided with a wall causing substantial damage. The airplane was equipped with a dual electronic ignition system, not magnetos. A constant source of electrical power was required for ignition. In the event of an electrical power loss, the engine would lose power. An FAA avionics inspector said the 5-amp main fuse had opened, probably due to a shorted wire inside the master relay, resulting in an over-current condition. This caused the master relay to de-energize and cut power to the bus. The alternator, which was tested to 10.5 volt output, has a nominal output of 13.8 volts. Minimal output to charge the battery is 12.5 volts. The FAA inspector's statement noted that the cockpit-mounted master switch activated the positive side of the master relay solenoid. Standard industry practice was to wire the positive side of the master relay to the unfused input from the battery, and then switch the negative side using the master switch. Some commercially available solenoids have the positive terminal wired to the battery input.
Probable cause
a total electrical failure due to a short in the master relay, causing the main fuse to open. Contributing factors included an inadequate electrical design by the airplane's builder, a low-output alternator, a cement wall, and unsuitable terrain on which to make a forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DEN05LA123
- Event ID
- 20050816X01251
- Case number
- DEN05LA123
- 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: 767261cf6778cc26aeac79fe029f339b642776b9f7a87e3cd895d885f412c807; retrieved 2026-09-22T05:31:35.432Z.