CEN18LA381 · Piper PA28 180
San Juan Flyers Piper PA28 180 · Accident: fuel starvation while maneuvering
From Stevens Field (PSO) to Stevens Field (PSO)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN18LA381
- 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
Piper PA28 180
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA28
- 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
- N8003W
- Operator
- San Juan Flyers
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Stevens Field (PSO), Pagosa Springs, COTo Stevens Field (PSO), Pagosa Springs, CO
- Aircraft age
- About 54 years (built 1964)
- 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 › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
- Personnel issues › Psychological
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The airline transport pilot rated flight instructor was introducing engine failure emergency procedures to the student pilot. Emergency procedures were reviewed inflight. The flight instructor then reduced the engine power to idle to simulate a loss of engine power. The student pilot conducted the emergency procedures on the left side of the cockpit that included switching the fuel tank selector position from right to left. The engine sputtered when the flight instructor subsequently added power to go around about 600 ft above the ground. The engine sputtered. Emergency procedures were reviewed again and the fuel pressure indication was zero. The flight instructor subsequently performed a forced landing where the airplane impacted fencing and ditches and came to rest in a field. Following the accident, the flight instructor noticed the fuel selector valve was about 1.5 to 2 inches between the left detent and off positions.
No preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures with the airframe and engine that would have precluded normal operation were reported by the flight instructor and the engine was operational during a subsequent examination of the accident airplane at the accident site.
It is likely the student pilot, while conducting the emergency procedure, mismanaged the positioning of the fuel selector valve. While the student pilot was conducting the emergency procedure, the flight instructor did not adequately supervise the student pilot to ensure the fuel selector valve was properly set to the correct position.
Probable cause
The student pilot's mismanagement of the fuel selector valve during the simulated forced landing demonstration and the flight instructor's inadequate supervision to ensure the fuel selector was properly set, which resulted in a loss of engine power and subsequent forced landing on unsuitable terrain.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN18LA381
- Event ID
- 20180919X52852
- Case number
- CEN18LA381
- 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: 72749186ab63628ca08a125ceb4181453f8e5e8cb3d5b09140f17dce4e2cb30c; retrieved 2026-09-16T08:15:35.318Z.