Incident Summary
An airplane landed short of the approach end of a runway following a landing gear extension malfunction. The nose and main landing gear were sheared off during the landing. The pilot had departed on a cross-country flight but was initially unable to retract the landing gear, prompting a diversion to another airport for inspection by a mechanic.
Landing Gear Issue
The mechanic placed the airplane on jacks, inspected, and functionally checked the landing gear system. No mechanical anomalies were noted, and the mechanic returned the airplane to service. The pilot then refueled the airplane to its capacity of 5.5 hours of flight time and continued to the destination airport.
Approximately four hours later, the pilot arrived at the destination airport, noting that it was still light outside. When he placed the landing gear handle in the down position, he did not receive a down and locked indication inside the cockpit. He attempted to manually lower the landing gear several times, but it did not fully extend. The pilot flew around the airport for an additional 1.5 hours attempting to extend the landing gear.
At that point, he realized the airplane was in a low fuel state and it had become dark outside. He did not feel that he could safely make it to a nearby airport and decided to perform a precautionary landing. Neither the pilot nor fire department personnel waiting on the ground could get the airport runway lights turned on. The airplane subsequently landed short of the runway.
Investigation
The Safety Board investigator-in-charge and a Federal Aviation Administration airworthiness inspector examined the landing gear system. Using an ohmmeter and the airplane's wiring diagram, they determined that the nose landing gear limit switch had an intermittent fault in the normally closed circuit position. According to the airplane's manufacturer, such an intermittent fault would cause the landing gear motor to fail to complete either the landing gear UP or DOWN cycle.