LAX06LA178 · Cessna T210L
Cessna T210L · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) during initial climb
From Chico Regional Airport (KCIC) to Watsonville Municipal Airport (KWVI)
Event
- NTSB case
- LAX06LA178
- 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 T210L
- 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
- N212DW
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Chico Regional Airport (KCIC), Chico, CATo Watsonville Municipal Airport (KWVI), Watsonville, CA
- 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 exhaustion
- 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 › Exhaustion
- Pilot in command › Aircraft preflight, inadequate
- 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
The airplane collided with terrain during a forced landing following a loss of engine power in the takeoff initial climb. The pilot flew into the airport the previous evening. He ordered fuel from the FBO. He said that when he arrived at the airport for the return flight home, he did not preflight the fuel tanks to check their quantity. He did a run-up before takeoff, and noted that everything was normal. He departed runway 13L, and noted a lower than optimum fuel flow. About 250 feet above ground level (agl), the engine lost power. He notified the tower, and turned back toward the airport. He set up a glide at 97 miles per hour (mph). When it became apparent that he could not make it to either runway, he chose to set the airplane down on a broken asphalt tarmac between the runways. He lowered the flaps, but did not lower the landing gear. The pilot said the descent was steep, and he flared too soon. The airplane stalled about 30 feet agl, and it hit the ground hard. The airplane skidded about 200 feet before coming to a stop. The pilot reported that the loss of power was due to fuel exhaustion. He also noted that the power off glide angle was uncomfortably steep; it was difficult to judge the proper point to flare. He recommended that these characteristics be emphasized in emergency training.
Probable cause
The loss of engine power due to the pilot's inadequate preflight inspection and failure to verify the amount of fuel onboard.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record LAX06LA178
- Event ID
- 20060602X00668
- Case number
- LAX06LA178
- 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: d6192d9f4dfb094d821111943c32b0a0fe0e2e5648b018c4c6ee86507f2c71f7; retrieved 2026-09-21T08:58:08.532Z.