CHI07LA097 · Cessna 150F
Cessna 150F · Accident: total loss of engine power (non-mechanical) on approach
From East Kansas City Airport (3GV) to 3GV
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI07LA097
- 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 150F
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 150
- 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
- N7893F
- Operator
- Robert M. hackett · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From East Kansas City Airport (3GV), Grain Valley, MOTo 3GV
- 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 base
- 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 › Fuel supply, 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 nosed over in a ditch during an off-airport forced landing following a loss of engine power. The pilot reported that he topped off the airplane with fuel on the day prior to the accident after which he made a 30-minute flight. He stated that on the day of the accident he checked the fuel by looking in the fuel tanks and by measuring the fuel quantity. The pilot indicated he had approximately 20 gallons of fuel prior to the accident flight, which was 1 hour in duration. The pilot reported that he was in the landing pattern and had just turned base to final when the engine lost power. The pilot reported that he tried to restart the engine to no avail and that he was not able to glide to the runway so he elected to land on a nearby road. During the landing roll the right wing tip collided with a road sign and the airplane then veered into a ditch and nosed over. The fuel capacity for the airplane is a total of 26 gallons of which approximately 3 ½ gallons are unusable. Personnel who recovered the wreckage stated there was no evidence of fuel leakage from the airplane when it was inverted on the ground. Fuel was noted to be leaking from the doorpost area when the airplane was being moved upright. Inspection of the airplane revealed that a headliner support tube had been rubbing on the right tank fuel line located in the top of the cockpit area. There was a hole visible in the fuel line. This area of the cockpit roof had also sustained crush damage as a result of the airplane flipping inverted. There were no visible signs that fuel had been leaking from the hole, prior to the accident, nor did the pilot report having noticed an odor of fuel in the cockpit. The airplane was turned upright and the master switch was turned on. It was noted the right fuel quantity indicator showed that the tank was empty and the left quantity indicator showed the left tank contained one-quarter tank of fuel. A total of 2 ½ gallons of fuel were drained from the airplane following the accident. The fuel quantity indicators were checked again and both indicated empty. Five gallons of fuel were then added to each fuel tank after which time the fuel quantity indicators both indicated one-quarter tank. The hole in the fuel line was patched and the engine was started and ran without interruption. It was noted that non-vented fuel caps were installed on the airplane. Vented fuel caps were required to be installed per FAA Airworthiness Directive 79-10-14 R1, Amendment 39-5901.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to assure an adequate fuel supply which resulted in fuel exhaustion. Factors associated with the accident were the street sign which was contacted, the pilot's inability to maintain directional control of the airplane and the ditch which was contacted.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI07LA097
- Event ID
- 20080404X00428
- Case number
- CHI07LA097
- 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: 3f961db373315cebe7b6164c6bb8c7ff99777a3e17442105b4f1ccf33d5acf24; retrieved 2026-09-22T03:55:40.861Z.