On September 11, 2020, about 0252 central daylight time, a Beech A36, N74HS, was substantially damaged when it was involved in an accident near McKellar-Spies Regional Airport (MKL), Jackson, Tennessee. The pilot was fatally injured. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 personal flight.
According to FAA inspectors, the evening before the accident, the pilot flew the airplane from Charles W Baker Airport (2M8), Millington, Tennessee, which was his home airport, to Dickson Municipal Airport (M02), Dickson, Tennessee, arriving about 2035 on September 10, 2020.
According to the manager at M02, surveillance video showed that upon arrival, the airplane taxied to the fuel farm, and the pilot exited the airplane and walked up to the fuel pump. He then returned to the airplane, started it, and taxied to the parking area. The manager stated that the fuel farm was operated by the fixed-base operator (FBO), and the pump was locked. The manager further stated that there was a sign on the FBO door advising anyone looking to purchase fuel to call an afterhours telephone number for service.
The M02 surveillance video showed the airplane about 0200 on September 11, 2020, taxiing back to the fuel farm, but the pilot did not exit the airplane. The airplane remained idling for about 3 minutes outside the fuel farm and departed the airport about 0206. According to the FAA, the pilot had filed a visual flight rules (VFR) flight plan from M02 to 2M8.
About 0248, the pilot requested a deviation from air traffic control to land at MKL. He advised the controller that he was experiencing a fuel issue, stating “we’re just a little low on fuel,” and needed to land. The controller provided a heading vector towards MKL and asked the pilot to report when he had the airport in sight. The pilot turned to the new heading, and flight track data showed the airplane began a descent from about 6,000 ft. No further communications were received from the pilot, and the last flight track data point recorded was at 0252 at an altitude of 525 ft. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) subsequently issued an Alert Notice (ALNOT), and the airplane was located later that morning about 1.5 miles west of MKL in a wooded area.
An inspection of the accident site by FAA inspectors revealed that the airplane had impacted trees and terrain and that all major components of the airplane were located at the accident site. The airplane was substantially damaged with the engine, propeller, and nose gear separated at the firewall and the right wing separated near the fuselage. There was no odor of fuel at the accident site. No fuel was found in the left fuel tank, and it was not breached. The right fuel tank was breached. The fuel inlet line attached to the manifold valve was removed and was absent of fuel. A trace amount of fuel was found in the engine driven fuel pump inlet line. Further examination of the airframe and engine after recovery revealed no evidence of any preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation.
A JPI engine data monitor was recovered from the wreckage and downloaded by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Vehicle Recorders Laboratory. Fuel flow rates indicated that about 0245, the flow dropped from 8.3 gallons per hour to 6 gallons per hour and then to 0. Fuel flowed intermittently at rates of 0.2 to 0.4 gallons per hour until 0247, at which time the fuel flow dropped to 0 and remained there until the engine data monitor stopped recording at 0251.
FAA inspectors collected the fueling records for the airplane and verified them using the pilot’s credit card statement records. The last known refueling event was on August 23, 2020, when the airplane was fueled with 43.0 gallons of 100LL aviation fuel at 2M8 airport. The airplane was flown 5.1 hours between the last refueling and the accident. The airplane had a usable fuel capacity of 74 gallons, which provided about 5 hours of flight time at a fuel burn rate of 15 gallons per hour.
The Office of the Medical Examiner, Center for Forensic Medicine, Nashville, Tennessee, performed the pilot’s autopsy. According to the autopsy report, the cause of death was multiple blunt force injuries. The autopsy did not identify any significant natural disease.
Two laboratories performed toxicological testing on specimens from the pilot. One laboratory identified ethanol at 0.119 grams per deciliter (g/dL) in femoral blood and 0.149 g/dL in vitreous. The other laboratory identified ethanol at 0.103 g/dL in cavity blood and 0.156 g/dL in vitreous. Ethanol is the intoxicating alcohol in beer, wine, and liquor. It can impair judgment, psychomotor performance, cognition, perception, and vigilance. FAA regulation prohibits any person from acting as a crewmember of a civil aircraft within 8 hours of consuming an alcoholic beverage or while having a blood ethanol level of 0.04 g/dL or greater. In general, the number and seriousness of pilot errors increase with blood ethanol level. Ethanol can also be produced by microbes in a person’s body after death.