20190627021519A

On 06/27/2019 at 1810L the accident pilot departed runway 13 at Eagles Landing Airport (5GA3) located in pike county Georgia, a 2500? Grass runway. The accident pilot stated that the engine run-up checks and the departure performance was normal, after gaining about 150 feet of altitude the pilot stated he lost complete engine power, the aircraft settled into a 50? Tree line 200? Past the departure end of the runway, the aircraft entered the trees tops wings level, decelerated and fell through the trees coming to rest upright in a 30 degree nose down attitude. Both wing tanks were breached and fuel was witnessed leaking from both tanks, the electric fuel pump was observed to be running, first responder?s secured the fuel pump and then electrical power via the ?batt? Switch, the pilot was extradited from the aircraft and subsequently medevac?d to a local trauma center with serious injuries. The pilot had just acquired this aircraft and had about 20 hours flight time in the accident aircraft including flights with the original aircraft builder.

On 06/28/2019 the aircraft was recovered from the crash site and moved to atlanta air salvage located in griffin Georgia for further investigation, on 07/02/2019 investigators removed the magnetos, engine driven fuel pump, carburetor, spark plugs and associated fuel plumbing. The engine was rotated by the propeller shaft and drive train continuity through the accessory gear train was confirmed, compression was present in all cylinders, spark plugs did not show signs of any unusual characteristics or wear. Engine oil was sampled and the oil filter was opened and examined, oil appeared normal in color and no metallic particles were noted in the oil filter. The carburetor, a facet model MA-4-5 was damaged in the crash which resulted in a fractured mounting flange, the carburetor remained in an upright position with the linkage still attached. The carburetor bowl was undamaged and investigators removed it from the throttle body, no fuel was present in the bowl, the accelerator pump well was also absent of fuel, the needle and seat assembly was inspected along with the brass floats, no obvious defects were noted, the fuel drain plug was present and tight. The engine driven fuel pump was checked for the presence of fuel, about 2 ounces of fuel was found in the diaphragm and attached fuel lines, the pump was operationally checked and appeared to function normally. The magnetos were checked and produced spark when rotated with a slow speed drill motor. The fuel supply line through the firewall was crushed in the crash, the fuel selector located near the floor and to the left of the center radio stack rotated normally, the selector handle resembles the early Cessna 140 design without a pointer and the selector valve handle is installed so that the handle indicates the position of the selector valve, when queried the pilot acknowledged he was aware of this design, and that the fuel selector was placed in the left tank position for this flight. The accident flight was the second flight since the last refueling, the aircraft was reported to have about half tanks when it departed. Although the exact cause of the engine failure could not be determined, interruption of the fuel supply to the engine appears to have likely occurred.