MIA08CA016 · Scottish Bulldog 120
Scottish Bulldog 120 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) en route
From Western Carolina Regional Airport (KRHP) to Gastonia Municipal Airport (KAKH)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA08CA016
- 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
Scottish Bulldog 120
- Aircraft type
- Scottish BULLDOG 120
- 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
- N9151R
- Operator
- Merlin J. Ramsey · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Western Carolina Regional Airport (KRHP), Andrews, NCTo Gastonia Municipal Airport (KAKH), Gastonia, NC
- 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
- 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; Tree(s)
- 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
- Pilot in command › Fuel consumption calculations, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot stated that he departed on a VFR flight and no flight plan was filed. He flew past his destination airport, reversed his course, descended down to 800 feet, and was in cruise flight when the engine lost power. An engine restart was not attempted and the pilot made a forced landing into the trees. The pilot stated that the airplane had not been registered with the FAA since he purchased it, and the condition inspection was expired. In addition, the pilot stated that he did not have a current flight review or medical certificate. The FAA examined the airplane and no anomalies were noted with the engine assembly and accessories, flight controls, or airframe. The fuel tanks were not ruptured and two ounces of fuel were drained from the lower fuselage fuel sump. Two gallons of fuel were drained from the main fuel tanks. The unusable fuel for the airplane is two gallons. The pilot stated to the NTSB that "he miscalculated his fuel burn rate which resulted in a total loss of engine power due to running out of gas."
Probable cause
The pilot's improper fuel consumption calculations resulting in a total loss of engine power due to fuel exhaustion and a forced landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA08CA016
- Event ID
- 20071119X01810
- Case number
- MIA08CA016
- 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. 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: ec34ec34e50599a90dee2df280c18c1ce8c1f248292c0ae2ee3d2536be1b3efe; retrieved 2026-09-22T03:17:21.140Z.