GAA17CA529 · Cessna 182 Q
Cessna 182 Q · Accident: fuel exhaustion en route
From Arlington Municipal Airport (AWO) to Glacier Park International Airport (GPI)
Event
- NTSB case
- GAA17CA529
- 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 182 Q
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 182
- 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
- N735KQ
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Arlington Municipal Airport (AWO), Arlington, WATo Glacier Park International Airport (GPI), Kalispell, MT
- Aircraft age
- About 40 years (built 1977)
- 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
- 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 exhaustion
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
- Aircraft › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that, during an instrument flight rules cross-country flight, he realized the airplane was "very low on fuel." He added that, with air traffic control's assistance, he diverted to an airport along his route, which was about 30 nautical miles from the intended destination. He further added that he had difficulty locating the airport visually, and when he did locate the runway, the airplane was "too high" to land. Subsequently, as the pilot continued descending and maneuvering toward the runway, the engine lost power, and he landed in a field. He added that, the airplane "hit the field hard," bounced, and struck a utility pole before stopping.
The pilot further reported in the NTSB Pilot/ Operator Aircraft Accident/ Incident Report that he was informed that no fuel was found in the airplane and that the right fuel cap was not installed. He reported that he added fuel to both fuel tanks at the departure airport and that there was a "possibility/ likelihood" that he did not secure the right fuel cap during preflight. He added that, during the diversion, he did not complete the "forced landing checklist."
The airplane was destroyed.
The pilot reported that there were no preaccident mechanical malfunctions or failures with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to secure the right fuel cap during the preflight inspection, which resulted in fuel exhaustion, a total loss of engine power, and an off-airport hard landing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record GAA17CA529
- Event ID
- 20170912X73446
- Case number
- GAA17CA529
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2017-09-07.
- API snapshot SHA-256: b2cd761a60440087c1424f7219ff477ab691811cf45fc19722dacc5d551dafc3; retrieved 2026-09-16T05:50:09.195Z.