2010-12 · NASA ASRS report 921885
PA28 pilot with instructor reports electrical failure during a flight down the Hudson River Class B Exclusion. The reporters are able to clear the area and return to their departure point safely.
I was flying southbound through the Hudson River Class B exclusion at 1;100 FT MSL; between the George Washington Bridge and the Intrepid. The Piper Warrior that I was flying experienced an electrical failure; which resulted in a loss of transponder output. I did not realize this until a helicopter relayed a request that I contact LGA Tower. Tuning the radio to LGA Tower; I was unable to make contact. About this time; the Flight Instructor mentioned that he could not hear me over the intercom. Further troubleshooting revealed that the ammeter was at 0. Battery power was insufficient to operate the radios; and I was unable to comply with LGA's request. I continued southbound out of the Class B exclusion to my destination; and the Flight Instructor I was flying with contacted LGA Tower via telephone. LGA Tower advised that the situation was resolved.Lesson learned: pay more attention to ammeter levels. I should have detected this earlier; and would have if I had included the ammeter in my scan. This aircraft was new to me; and the ammeter was not in a position that readily fell into my scan; so I neglected it. Not a mistake I'll make again.
We flew north to the Verrazano Bridge remaining below NYC Class B airspace at all times. Once we got to the bridge; we flew the Hudson Exclusion up to the Alpine Tower at 1;100 MSL. We did a course reversal at the Alpine Tower and started to head back. When we got just south of the Intrepid; a helicopter called us up on the Hudson CTAF telling us to contact LGA Tower. I questioned the helicopter as to why I needed to contact LGA Tower. They informed us that LGA told them that our transponder wasn't working. I then found the frequency for LGA Tower and put it into the radio. By the time I went to make the radio call; the radios had failed. At this point; I had realized that we had lost all electrical power. I squawked 7600 and continued to make radio reports in the blind to LGA and on the Hudson CTAF. Once we got back to the Verrazano bridge; we continued to remain below NYC Class B airspace. Once on the ground; I called LGA Tower on the phone and explained what had happened.
Source: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (public domain). Reports are voluntary submissions and are not verified by NASA.
Loading the flight search…
Pick an aircraft model — Boeing 737, Airbus A320, A380, Boeing 787 Dreamliner and more — enter your origin airport, and FlightFinder shows every route that plane flies from there with live fares.
We support Boeing 737/747/757/767/777/787, the full Airbus A220/A319/A320/A321/A330/A340/A350/A380 family, Embraer E170/E175/E190/E195, Bombardier CRJ and Dash 8, and the ATR 42/72 turboprops.
Search and schedules are free. Pro ($4.99/month, $39/year, or $99 one-time lifetime) unlocks the enriched flight card — on-time stats, CO₂ per passenger, amenities, live gate & weather — plus My Trips with push alerts.
Live schedules come from Amadeus, AeroDataBox and Travelpayouts. Observed routes (which aircraft actually flew a given city pair) are crowdsourced from adsb.lol ADS-B data under the Open Database License.