LAX06FA113 · Cessna 210M
Cessna 210M · Accident: airframe, component or system failure en route
From Compton Woodley Airport (CPM) to Compton Woodley Airport (CPM)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX06FA113
- 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
Cessna 210M
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 210
- 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
- N6895B
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Compton Woodley Airport (CPM), Compton, CATo Compton Woodley Airport (CPM)
- 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
- En route · cruise
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Electrical system, alternator › Output low
- Electrical system, battery › Discharged
- Engine instruments, fuel flow gage › Unreliable
- Unknown › Maintenance, installation, inadequate
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 collided with shipping containers while attempting to make a precautionary landing at a pier due to a pilot perceived low fuel state. The pilot passed away several months after the accident and was never able to provide a statement. A witness, who saw the crash and responded to the site to render aid, asked the pilot what had happened. The pilot told the witness that he was trying to land due to low fuel state. First responders observed large amounts of fuel leaking out of the damaged wing tanks and from the lower forward fuselage where the header tanks and fuel lines are located. Fuel was still leaking from the airplane when Safety Board investigators arrived 2 hours after the accident. The airframe and engine were examined with no mechanical anomalies noted that would have precluded normal operation. Investigators were not able to establish at what time the pilot departed from Compton or when the pilot had last refueled the airplane. Investigators found that the alternator circuit breaker was tripped. An alternator was found in the wreckage of the cabin and examination revealed that it had a shorted internal diode. The alternator attached to the engine was missing the grounding post and the associated ground wire. The ground strap between the engine and the airframe had been disconnected, with the disconnected end weathered and worn. The airplane manufacturer's technical representative indicated that the fuel level for this airplane is sensed from a variable resistance float assembly that can indicate lower fuel levels than actual as the electrical system voltage drops. Due to the poor condition of the alternator, it is highly likely that the battery was discharging and the voltage level dropping. If that were the case, then the variable resistance float assembly for the fuel gage level would have started to show a lower than expected fuel level indication inside the cockpit leading the pilot to believe that the airplane was experiencing a low fuel state situation. Only partial maintenance records were recovered and the recent maintenance that may have been performed, if any, on the electrical system could not be determined.
Probable cause
an erroneous low fuel quantity indication that led the pilot to attempt a precautionary landing in a congested and less than ideal location. The erroneous fuel level indication was due to multiple anomalies with the alternator installation that precipitated a low system voltage and adversely affected the accuracy of the fuel indicating system. The alternator anomalies were the result of inadequate maintenance by unknown persons or institutions.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX06FA113
- Event ID
- 20060217X00211
- Case number
- LAX06FA113
- 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 2006-02-13.
- API snapshot SHA-256: fdd6f3cfcbebd1f71d98bf9c2b327345c0c80c71ab1b555722ce2d91dc4d52c2; retrieved 2026-09-21T09:00:15.975Z.