Cessna 172E N5638T

Summary

On 13 April 2001 at about 02:46 local time, a Cessna 172E registered N5638T was involved in an accident near Bay City, Texas, United States. One person was on board and one died. The aircraft was destroyed. The NTSB has published a probable cause for this accident; it is quoted in full below.

Date

13 April 2001 at 02:46

Classification

Accident

Location

Bay City, Texas, United States

Nearest airport

Baycity Municipal (3R1)

Coordinates

29.1139, -95.9525

Aircraft

Cessna 172E

Registration

N5638T

Category

Airplane

Engines

1

Operator

Not recorded

Operating rule

Part 91: General Aviation

Purpose of flight

Personal

Phase of flight

Not recorded

Route

Junction → Baycity

Aircraft damage

Destroyed

Weather

VMC

Light

Night/Dark

NTSB number

FTW01FA098

1 person died.

the pilot's delay in taking remedial action (contacting ATC) after he became lost/disoriented during a night cross country flight, which resulted in a forced landing due to fuel exhaustion. Contributing factors to the accident were the pilot's failure to contact a flight service station for a weather briefing, the low clouds and dark night light conditions.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record. This site does not paraphrase or interpret it.

Read the full NTSB narrative

The night cross country visual flight rules flight had been airborne for 3 hours and 37 minutes when the instrument rated pilot reported to a local flight service station (FSS) that he had 10 minutes of fuel on board, and was disoriented. The FSS connected the pilot with the Houston Air Route Traffic Control Center, who provided radar vectors to the nearest airport. However, 10 minutes later the pilot reported that he had run out of fuel and, subsequently, the final radar return was received. The airplane impacted a fence and trees 10 miles north of the destination airport. Review of the radar track revealed that, during the final 36 minutes of the flight, the airplane was not maintaining a constant altitude and had been making "S" turns, 360-degree turns, and at one point had flown past the destination airport. Marginal visual meteorological conditions and patchy instrument meteorological conditions existed near the accident site and destination airport. There was no record of the pilot having received a weather briefing from a flight service station prior to or during the flight. The airplane was examined and the integrity of the fuel system was confirmed. Further examination of the fuel system revealed that only unusable fuel was present in the fuel system. No anomalies were found with the airframe or engine that would have precluded operation of the airplane.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record.