- Date
- November 23, 1988, 11:36 local (16:36 UTC)
- Place
- Ft Mill, SC
- Injuries
- 1 uninjured
- Damage
- Substantial damage
- Phase of flight
- Approach
- Aircraft
- N6711PPiper PA-24-250
- Weather
- Instrument (IMC) · Day
- Status
- Completed · report January 8, 1990
- Report
- Approved by Office Director
- FAA report
- 19881123051859A
- Case key
- 7962
From the NTSB’s public API. By law, NTSB reports can’t be used as evidence in lawsuits over the accident.
On this page
Sequence of events
NTSB’s coding before 2008: each occurrence and phase of flight, and the causes and factors under it. The codes are defined in NTSB’s coding manual.
Analysis
Two days before the acdnt, the plt had fueled the acft to capacity & flown it a short distance to his house at a pvt airstrip. After the flt, he noticed fuel on the tops of both wings, aft of the fuel filler caps. He was aware that fuel had leaked from the thermos type fuel caps. During the next flt, when the acft was on an ILS apch to the destn arpt, the eng lost power from fuel exhaustion. The plt descended below the cloud layer & made an emergency landing in a peach orchard, where the acft was damaged. The acft had flown 3.63 hrs since it was last refueled. The plt rprtd it had at least 4.3 hrs of fuel on board after the last refueling. He believed that some 5 to 6 gal of fuel had siphoned from each tank. AD 68-13-03 required an inspn of the fuel caps for dryness & hardness after each 100 hrs of flt. The last entry in the log for compliance with this AD was in 1985 at aprx 2590 hrs. Total airframe time on the date of the acdnt was 2981 hrs.
Aircraft
- Registration
- N6711P
- Reported as
- Piper PA-24-250
- Category
- Airplane
- Serial number
- 24-1837
- Airframe hours
- 2,981
- Engine
- Lycoming O-540-A1A5, 250 horsepower, reciprocating
- Damage
- Substantial damage
- Flight
- Personal · Part 91
- Registered owner
- Roger L. Millheim/Inge E.
- Airworthiness certificate
- Standard, Normal
- Last inspection
- Annual · February 10, 1988 · 87 hours before
- Departed
- X05 · Brooksville, FL
- Destination
- CLT · Charlotte, NC
- Flight plan
- IFR
- Airport
- CLT · Charlotte/Douglas Intl, runway 36R, 7,845 × 150 ft, asphalt
Matched to the registry by N-number and the event date; the registry’s history has gaps, so older matches can be wrong. Compare the reported make and model.
Flight crew
As NTSB recorded them. NTSB leaves out names.
- Role
- Pilot
- Age
- 42
- Certificate
- Commercial
- Airplane ratings
- Multi-engine land, Single-engine land
- Instrument ratings
- Airplane
- Medical
- Class 2, Valid Medical--w/ waivers/lim
- Seat
- Left
- Flight hours
- 2,132 total · 32 in this make and model · 1,792 as pilot in command · 32 in the last 90 days · 12 in the last 30 days · 1 in the last 24 hours
Weather
- Conditions
- Instrument (IMC) · Day
- Wind
- 20° at 7 knots
- Visibility
- 2 statute miles
- Lowest ceiling
- 800 ft broken
- Temperature
- 45 °F, dew point 39 °F
- Altimeter
- 30.00 inHg
- Observed at
- CLT, 10 nm away
FAA reports on this event · 1
The FAA’s own accident and incident reports, matched to the aircraft by N-number and date.
Other investigations on N6711P · 3
Matched to the same aircraft by N-number and date.