ERA12LA295 · Raytheon Aircraft Company A36
Raytheon Aircraft Company A36 · Accident: fuel starvation en route
From Teterboro Airport (TEB) to Norwood Memorial Airport (OWD)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA12LA295
- 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
Raytheon Aircraft Company A36
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 36
- 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
- N821SM
- Operator
- Ehrenzeller Mark
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Teterboro Airport (TEB), Teterboro, NJTo Norwood Memorial Airport (OWD), Norwood, 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
- En route · cruise
- 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
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was in cruise flight at 7,000 feet when the engine lost power. The pilot requested vectors to the nearest airport but determined the airplane would not reach the requested landing site. He selected a forced landing site on a corporate complex and completed the forced landing, which resulted in substantial damage to the airplane. During the descent, he stated that he performed remedial actions in accordance with the checklist and switched the fuel selector from the right tank position to the left tank. Later, the pilot stated that he did not consult a checklist, but performed emergency action items "from memory." He added that the engine would surge during the descent but would not produce sufficient power to maintain altitude. A witness stated that he saw the airplane at low altitude near the campus and described the engine sound as surging between idle and "extremely high rpm." He said that the engine sounded as though it was "starving for fuel." Examination of the airplane revealed no preimpact mechanical anomalies. The fuel selector was found in a position between the left tank and right tank detents. A detailed examination revealed continuity of the fuel system, unobstructed fuel lines and filters, and an operational fuel selector. The engine was removed from the airplane and placed in a test cell, where it started immediately, accelerated smoothly, and ran continuously without interruption. The engine run revealed no anomalies that would have prevented normal operation and the production of rated power.
A warning in the airplane manufacturer's Pilot's Operating Handbook stated:
"POSITION [Fuel] SELECTOR IN DETENTS ONLY – NO FUEL FLOW TO ENGINE BETWEEN DETENTS"
It is likely that the pilot moved the fuel selector during cruise flight but did not ensure that it was seated correctly in the detent. Shortly thereafter, the engine lost power. Because the pilot did not perform the requisite emergency procedures, he did not recognize that the fuel selector was not seated properly.
Probable cause
The pilot's improper placement of the fuel selector, which resulted in fuel starvation and a total loss of engine power. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's failure to perform the published emergency procedure by the checklist.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA12LA295
- Event ID
- 20120422X94838
- Case number
- ERA12LA295
- 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: e094a2204da2aefa85adec0e1d2dc3f08dbbf21c0cbc90980bdd07273cdad1fb; retrieved 2026-09-15T17:51:46.164Z.