CEN09CA559 · Navion NAVION G
Navion NAVION G · Accident: fuel starvation while maneuvering
From Andrews University Airpark (C20) to Andrews University Airpark (C20)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN09CA559
- 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
Navion NAVION G
- Aircraft type
- Navion G
- 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
- N2418T
- Operator
- Regal David N
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Andrews University Airpark (C20), Berrien Springs, MITo Andrews University Airpark (C20), Berrien Springs, MI
- 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
- Maneuvering
- Defining eventThe 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
- Fuel starvation
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
- Aircraft › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot departed the airport and the fuel selector was in the main fuel tank position. The main fuel tank contained 32.5 gallons of fuel. Approximately 5 minutes after departure, the pilot turned the fuel selector to the right tip fuel tank. After 15 minutes, the engine lost power. The pilot attempted to switch fuel tanks and restart the engine, but the attempt was unsuccessful. The pilot then elected to execute a forced landing to a field. During the forced landing, the airplane impacted terrain and the firewall buckled. According to the Federal Aviation Administration inspector, the right tip fuel tank showed "trace amounts of fuel", and the pilot stated he did not check the fuel tank levels prior to departure. The pilot stated to the FAA inspector, "Had I had another 5 gallons [of fuel] in the tip, I would have been okay." Examination of the airplane's fuel system revealed no mechanical anomalies.
Probable cause
A loss of engine power due to fuel starvation as a result of the pilot's inadequate fuel management.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN09CA559
- Event ID
- 20090904X82756
- Case number
- CEN09CA559
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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: 8e5167bc711f2765f1658e6ffbe741061d45f1afa42ebeaea9ba84052ab34014; retrieved 2026-09-15T12:53:28.385Z.