Cessna 402C N819BW

Summary

On 27 April 1999 at about 14:16 local time, a Cessna 402C registered N819BW was involved in an accident near Goldsby, Oklahoma, United States. One person was on board and one died. The aircraft was destroyed. The NTSB has published a probable cause for this accident; it is quoted in full below.

Date

27 April 1999 at 14:16

Classification

Accident

Location

Goldsby, Oklahoma, United States

Coordinates

35.1101, -97.4907

Aircraft

Cessna 402C

Registration

N819BW

Category

Airplane

Engines

2

Operator

Not recorded

Operating rule

Part 135: Air Taxi & Commuter

Purpose of flight

Unknown

Phase of flight

Not recorded

Route

Dallas → Oklahoma City

Aircraft damage

Destroyed

Weather

VMC

Light

Day

NTSB number

FTW99FA123

1 person died.

The fatigue failure of the right wing spar as a result of inadequate quality control during manufacture of the spar. A factor was the inadequate inspection of the right wing by maintenance personnel, which failed to detect the crack.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record. This site does not paraphrase or interpret it.

Read the full NTSB narrative

The twin-engine airplane impacted the ground in an uncontrolled descent following the in-flight separation of the right wing during a normal descent. The airplane had accumulated a total time of 20,457 hours and had been flown 52 hours since the most recent annual inspection, which was performed by the current operator 3 weeks prior to the accident. Available maintenance records indicated that since 1988, maintenance personnel had made numerous repairs to the right wing, including repairing skin cracks, working rivets, wing stub spar straps, and the right main landing gear. Metallurgical examination revealed that the right wing's front spar failed due to fatigue that started at an area of mechanical damage and rough machining marks. The presence of primer covering the mechanical damage strongly suggests that the damage was produced during the manufacturing process. It could not be determined whether the mechanical damage or the machining, acting alone, could have caused the fatigue cracking to initiate. Fatigue cracking found on the rear spar and the forward auxiliary spar is most likely secondary fatigue due to load shedding as the crack grew in the front spar.

Quoted verbatim from the NTSB record.