ERA19LA024 · Beech 35 J35
Beech 35 J35 · Accident: loss of engine power (total) on approach
From Portsmouth International Airport at Pease (PSM) to State College Regional Airport (UNV)
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
- ERA19LA024
- 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
Beech 35 J35
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 35
- 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
- N8319D
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Portsmouth International Airport at Pease (PSM), Portsmouth, NHTo State College Regional Airport (UNV), State College, PA
- Aircraft age
- About 60 years (built 1958)
- 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 · VFR pattern final
- 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
- Loss of engine power (total)
- 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 airline transport pilot reported that he departed on a long, cross-country flight at night with full fuel tanks. The pilot stated that the fuel selector was set to the left main fuel tank on departure and that he moved the selector to the auxiliary tank about 1 hour later. About 1 to 2 hours after that, the pilot moved the fuel selector switch to the right main fuel tank, where it remained for the remainder of the flight (about 30 minutes). The flight was uneventful until it was on final approach to land and between about 400 and 500 ft above ground level, at which point, the engine suddenly stopped producing power. The pilot recalled the passenger saying there was no fuel pressure, and he immediately pushed the throttle and mixture full forward and retracted the flaps. He also turned on the auxiliary fuel pump and pressed the starter button to restart the engine to no avail. The pilot did not switch the fuel selector to another tank. Due to the low altitude, the pilot slowed the airplane and conducted an emergency landing in trees, during which both wings, the fuselage, and the tail section sustained substantial damage.
Postaccident examination of the engine and fuel system revealed no evidence of any preaccident mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation. The fuel selector was found set to the right main fuel tank, which was found empty of fuel. However, measurable fuel was found in the remaining three tanks. Therefore, the loss of engine power was likely due to the pilot's mismanagement of the available fuel, which resulted in the loss of all engine power due to fuel starvation.
Probable cause
The pilot's mismanagement of the available fuel, which resulted in a total loss of engine power due to fuel starvation.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA19LA024
- Event ID
- 20181024X75115
- Case number
- ERA19LA024
- 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: 16ca66d14a7ec648b7841dd040a79b71b424adf72b422eb7adb28c603ee40f07; retrieved 2026-09-16T08:22:55.572Z.