Incident Details
While inbound to his destination, the pilot reported that the engine began to miss. It resumed running a couple of times but finally stopped altogether. The pilot executed a forced landing on a dirt road, which resulted in damage to the aircraft. The fuel system was found to be intact by aircraft retrieval personnel, who recovered less than 2 gallons of fuel from both main tanks. Safety Board investigators were able to successfully start and run the engine after the accident.
Flight Planning and Fuel Consumption
The aircraft had been last serviced with 20.8 gallons of aviation fuel the previous day. The pilot computed the fuel requirement for the flight using the fuel consumption chart in the pilot operator's handbook. After a flight of 0.2 hours on the day before, the pilot estimated that he had 3 hours 55 minutes of fuel remaining (without reserve) for his cross-country flight. At the time the engine quit, the Hobbs meter showed that a total of 3 hours 36 minutes had elapsed. The average fuel consumption for the fuel load was 6.8 gallons per hour. The aircraft's fuel capacity is 26 gallons, with 1.5 gallons unusable.
Pilot's Acknowledgment
When asked about his planning, the pilot acknowledged that his estimate of 6 gallons per hour had not considered the additional fuel requirements for his initial takeoff and climb, nor the seven other landings and takeoffs that he subsequently made since his last refueling. According to the POH performance charts, start, taxi, and takeoff requires 0.8 gallons of fuel.