MIA08CA017 · Piper PA-28-140
Piper PA-28-140 · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From Cape Cod Gateway Airport (HYA) to Cape Cod Gateway Airport (HYA)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA08CA017
- 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
Piper PA-28-140
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- 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
- N9610W
- Operator
- David Mccrosin
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Cape Cod Gateway Airport (HYA), Hyannis, MATo Cape Cod Gateway Airport (HYA), Hyannis, MA
- 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
- 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
- Pole
- 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
- Dual student › Fuel tank selector position, improper
- Pilot in command(cfi) › Supervision, 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 student pilot stated that he departed the Barnstable Municipal Airport-Boardman/ Ploando field (HYA), Hyannis, Massachusetts on an instructional flight with his certified flight instructor (CFI). After flying for about 40 minutes, he radioed the HYA control tower with ATIS information foxtrot. He stated at that time he believed that he switched the fuel tank selector from the left tank to off to right tank position. Then he pulled the power back and continued his descent. At about 400 feet he attempted to add power with no response from the engine. He informed the CFI that there was no power, they were losing altitude, and that they would not make it to the HYA airfield. According to him, the instructor then took control of the airplane and turned to avoid trees and power lines. The CFI landed the airplane in a field adjacent to the airfield, and collided with a pole. The student pilot continued by saying that after reviewing what happened, he realized that the fuel selector goes from "left to right to off, not the way he thought." He went on to say, that "he was not fully knowledgeable of the equipment on the plane." According to the CFI, they were cleared for the "touch and go." He reported that at 400 feet the student pilot informed him that there was no power from the engine. He immediately took control of the airplane, and made an emergency landing.
Probable cause
The student pilot's mismanagement of the fuel supply and the flight instructor's inadequate supervision.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA08CA017
- Event ID
- 20080304X00262
- Case number
- MIA08CA017
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (5)
- 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: 8f248f4eaa19d21372e0e53db5c1feeacaea1789f9a86304256575273a678391; retrieved 2026-09-22T03:16:34.119Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: destination. The narrative states the instructional flight departed "(HYA), Hyannis, Massachusetts" and was cleared for a "touch and go" there when the engine lost power and "they would not make it to the HYA airfield"; the destination was not recorded.