What happened
On 5 January 2018, a Cessna 172, registration TUX, performed a forced landing in scrubland following the exhaustion of its usable fuel supply. The flight originated from Kalgoorlie, but the aircraft ran out of fuel approximately 3 hours and 38 minutes into the flight, roughly 72 km from the intended destination. While the engine power began to decrease, the pilot utilized experience from instructing student pilots on emergency protocols to manage the workload, which facilitated a successful forced landing.
The investigation
The investigation focused on why the aircraft's fuel supply was insufficient for the planned mission. It was determined that the pilot's pre-flight planning did not meet regulatory requirements or the operator's specific procedures for flight preparation and fuel management. The pilot operated under the assumption that the aircraft's endurance remained at 4 hours, a figure consistent with the aircraft's configuration prior to January 2017.
Crucially, the pilot did not identify that the installation of new wings and subsequent fuel system calibration had reduced the aircraft's fuel tank capacity. The pilot failed to notice changes to the flight manual, the cockpit fuel calibration card, or the tank placards. Furthermore, as this was the aircraft's first flight since returning to service, no Trip Sheet was available to alert the pilot to the change in capacity. The investigation also found that the reduction in total fuel tank capacity had not been formally published in the operator's Safety Management System to notify line pilots of the modification.
Findings
- The pilot's in-flight fuel management was likely based on expected endurance rather than the required 30-minute interval crosschecks of actual fuel burn.
- During the flight, the pilot noticed the fuel gauge indications were decreasing steadily and appeared lower than expected at a specific waypoint, but chose to discount the accuracy of these readings.
- The failure to communicate the reduced fuel capacity through the operator's safety systems and the pilot's inadequate pre-flight and in-flight fuel monitoring resulted in the engine power loss.
- There were no fatalities or injuries reported during the forced landing.