ERA17LA212 · Aero Commander 200D D
Aero Commander 200D D · Accident: fuel starvation on approach
From Malden Regional Airport (MAW) to Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport (ECP)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's location. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA17LA212
- 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
Aero Commander 200D D
- Aircraft type
- Aero Commander 200
- 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
- N929DM
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Malden Regional Airport (MAW), Malden, MOTo Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport (ECP), Panama City, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 51 years (built 1966)
- 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
- 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 › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The private pilot topped off the airplane's four fuel tanks (20 gallons each, 18.5 of which was usable) before the estimated 2 hour 20 minute flight. He departed with the left main fuel tank selected and switched to each of the other three tanks for about 30 minutes each before turning the selector back to the left main tank for the remainder of the flight. About 20 minutes after switching back to the left main tank, the engine experienced a total loss of power. The pilot reported that the airplane would not maintain altitude, so he focused on making a forced landing and did not use the emergency checklist (which included switching to another fuel tank) to restart the engine. The airplane stalled right before touchdown and landed hard, which resulted in substantial damage to both wings and the fuselage.
Postaccident examination of the airplane revealed that the left main fuel tank was intact and empty. The left auxiliary fuel tank was breeched, and a small amount of fuel was found in the tank. The right-wing fuel tanks were not compromised, and about 13 gallons of fuel were drained from the auxiliary tank and about 11.5 gallons were drained from the main tank. Although a fuel supply line to the fuel manifold was found loose during postaccident examination, no fuel stains were observed on the attaching b-nut, fire sleeve, or surrounding area. Based on the condition of the b-nut and lack of stains surrounding the b-nut, the fuel supply line was likely not loose before the accident.
During a postaccident engine test-run, the b-nut was correctly installed, and the engine started immediately and ran without hesitation. Examination and the test-run of the engine revealed no evidence of any preaccident mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation. Given that the pilot was operating the airplane on the left main fuel tank at the time the engine lost power and that the tank was found empty, the loss of engine power was likely due to fuel starvation, which resulted from the pilot's mismanagement of the fuel. The pilot's failure to use the emergency checklist and select a different tank when the loss of power occurred contributed to the accident.
Probable cause
The pilot's inadequate fuel management, which resulted in a total loss of engine power due to fuel starvation. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's failure to use the emergency checklist to restart the engine.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA17LA212
- Event ID
- 20170624X52152
- Case number
- ERA17LA212
- 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: 0176f8906a69211096df79d1f4ef2eed3746b36d794e13c11935d95ff2a09fde; retrieved 2026-09-16T05:27:04.450Z.