- Date
- July 9, 1989, 11:33 local (18:33 UTC)
- Place
- Los Angeles, CA
- Injuries
- 1 serious, 1 minor
- Damage
- Destroyed
- Phase of flight
- Enroute
- Aircraft
- N609ACCessna P210N
- Weather
- Visual (VMC) · Day
- Status
- Completed · report July 22, 1992
- Report
- Approved by Office Director
- FAA report
- 19890709020999A
- Case key
- 26442
From the NTSB’s public API. By law, NTSB reports can’t be used as evidence in lawsuits over the accident.
On this page
Probable cause
An undertorqued oil line fitting, due to its improper installation by maintenance personnel, which resulted in a loose oil line fitting, an oil line leak, oil exhaustion, and subsequent failure of the engine.
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
On the first flt after the acft's annual inspection following replacement of all oil lines, the CFI planned to give the acft's owner/plt a bfr. Five min after takeoff, the crew observed that the oil pressure gage indicated near zero lbs of pressure. The CFI monitored the oil temp gage & the temp was in the green arc. The crew alerted ATC of the situation & rec'd an IFR clearance back to the arpt. During the next 14 min, the oil pressure needle remained slightly above red line, the oil temp remained stable & in the green arc. The acft passed the final approach fix & continued to operate normally. Suddenly, all eng pwr was lost. The CFI made a forced ldg on a golf course 3 mi fm the arpt. Exam of the eng revealed internal heat distress & broken conn rods. Further exam revealed a 'b' nut on a newly installed oil line had not been securely torqued & had come loose at its eng case attachment fitting. The oil line was found saturated with oil.
Aircraft
- Registration
- N609AC
- Reported as
- Cessna P210N
- Category
- Airplane
- Serial number
- P21000609
- Airframe hours
- 1,058
- Engine
- Continental TSIO-520-P, 285 horsepower, reciprocating
- Damage
- Destroyed
- Fire
- On-Ground
- Flight
- Instructional · Part 91
- Registered owner
- Parvez Gondal, M.D.
- Airworthiness certificate
- Standard, Normal
- Last inspection
- Annual · July 1, 1989 · 1 hours before
- Departed
- SMO · Santa Monica, CA
- Flight plan
- IFR
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
- 43
- Certificates
- Flight instructor, Airline transport
- Airplane ratings
- Single-engine land, Multi-engine land, Single-engine sea
- Instrument ratings
- Airplane
- Medical
- Class 1, Valid Medical--no waivers/lim.
- Seat
- Right
- Flight hours
- 5,700 total · 500 in this make and model · 10 in the last 90 days
Weather
- Conditions
- Visual (VMC) · Day
- Wind
- 240° at 5 knots
- Visibility
- 7 statute miles
- Lowest ceiling
- 1,200 ft broken
- Temperature
- 73 °F, dew point 63 °F
- Altimeter
- 29.00 inHg
- Observed at
- SMO, 3 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.