ERA22LA052 · Maule M-4-220C
Maule M-4-220C · Accident: loss of engine power (total) during initial climb
From an unrecorded airport to Air Harbor Airport (W88)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA22LA052
- 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
- 0
- 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
Maule M-4-220C
- Aircraft type
- Maule M-4
- 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
- N51127
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Air Harbor Airport (W88), Greensboro, NC
- Aircraft age
- About 48 years (built 1973)
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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 pilot reported that he conducted a walk-around of the airplane before boarding for the accident flight. After engine start, he noted more fuel in the right tank with the fuel totalizer reading 9.8 gallons and selected that tank for takeoff. After departure, while in the climb, the airplane experienced a total loss of engine power. The pilot stated he pitched the airplane forward and switched the fuel selector to both tanks just before they impacted trees at the end of the runway, which resulted in substantial damage to both wings. The pilot turned off the power and closed the fuel selector valve before egressing the airplane.
During a post-accident examination, the fuel strainer was drained and a trace amount of residual fuel was present. Three of the 4 wing tanks were opened with fuel in both left tanks, but the right inboard tank showed no fuel and the right outboard tank was inaccessible. Additionally, the airport owner reported that he met the pilot on the runway after the accident, and the pilot stated, “the engine quit”, and “fuel may have been an issue.” The pilot reported no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures with the airplane that would have precluded normal operation.
Probable cause
The pilot’s improper fuel management which resulted in a loss of engine power due to fuel exhaustion. Contributing to the accident was the pilot’s inadequate preflight inspection.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA22LA052
- Event ID
- 20211109104220
- Case number
- ERA22LA052
- 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, cause areas. 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: 16da070f968d63b6882aa39f8408a19ccd342a0a68e7cd616c85698b663c1545; retrieved 2026-09-16T14:43:45.420Z.