CEN23LA088 · Beech M35
TFF Beech M35 · Accident en route
From West Houston Airport (IWS) to Liberty Municipal Airport (T78)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's damage. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN23LA088
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Beech M35
- 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
- N9306Y
- Operator
- TFF
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From West Houston Airport (IWS), Houston, TXTo Liberty Municipal Airport (T78), Liberty, TX
- Aircraft age
- About 63 years (built 1960)
- 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
- Unknown or undetermined
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial Possible conflict
Cause areas
- Not determined › Not determined
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, not marked as estimated; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot was conducting an aerial survey flight when the engine lost all power during cruise flight. The pilot was unable to restore engine power and he conducted a forced landing to a multi-lane highway. The airplane’s right main landing gear impacted the roof of a semi-trailer before the airplane rolled left wing down and descended into a concrete highway median. A postaccident fire ensued that destroyed most of the fuselage, cabin, and cockpit.
A comprehensive examination of the airplane’s fuel system was not possible due to extensive thermal damage sustained during the postaccident fire. About 25 gallons of fuel was reportedly recovered from the fuel system before the wreckage was moved, but the amount of fuel recovered from each fuel tank was not individually documented. Both left and right wingtip fuel tanks exhibited extensive thermal damage and no residual fuel was found within the wingtip tanks. Fuel drained from the fuel selector when it was removed from the wreckage. The airframe fuel filter contained 1/8 to 1/4 cup of fuel. The fuel strainer was largely unobstructed, with only minor debris present.
The airplane’s digital engine monitor was destroyed during the postaccident fire. Based on the pilot’s explanation of the fuel load, how the fuel was used during the flight, and a reported fuel consumption rate of 13.5 gallons per hour during cruise flight, there should have been ample fuel remaining to sustain normal engine operation. Examination of the engine did not reveal any preaccident mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have prevented normal operation. Ultimately, the investigation was unable to determine the reason for the loss of engine power.
Probable cause
A loss of engine power during cruise flight for undetermined reasons.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN23LA088
- Event ID
- 20230123106620
- Case number
- CEN23LA088
- 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, coordinates, 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: e0c28f0702a3329a80354acdad8475cd15e5ebabbb552d9d67599414e88e631c; retrieved 2026-09-16T17:16:15.573Z.