ERA22LA082 · Beech S35
James Hunt / AeroMed Transport Beech S35 · Accident: loss of engine power (total) en route
From St. Petersburg Clearwater International Airport (PIE) to Columbus Airport (CSG)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA22LA082
- 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
- Event fatalities
- Unknown
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Beech S35
- 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
- N80YD
- Operator
- James Hunt / AeroMed Transport
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From St. Petersburg Clearwater International Airport (PIE), St Petersburg, FLTo Columbus Airport (CSG), Columbus, GA
- Aircraft age
- About 57 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
- 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
- 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 › Aircraft power plant
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that, during a cross-country flight under instrument flight rules, he smelled burning oil. The engine oil pressure decreased to zero and the pilot declared an emergency with air traffic control. While diverting to a nearby airport, smoke began to enter the cabin before the engine lost all power. The airplane descended through the clouds and the pilot attempted to perform a forced landing to a dirt road, but impacted trees during the landing, which resulted in substantial damage to both wings and the left ruddervator. Postaccident examination of the engine revealed evidence of lubrication distress that ultimately resulted in the failure of three of the engine’s six connecting rods. Based on this evidence and the pilot’s description that a burning oil smell and loss of oil pressure preceded the loss of engine power, it is likely that the engine began to leak oil at some point during the flight; however, the reason for or source of the oil leak was not determined.
Probable cause
A total loss of engine power due to a lack of oil lubrication.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA22LA082
- Event ID
- 20211207104358
- Case number
- ERA22LA082
- 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: cb5e1f4ce249fbe60df6dd9eaee4fc78092401ddf341bd9eb718f98eef682f9e; retrieved 2026-09-16T14:48:37.321Z.