Fuel Cap...

F

FuelCapMan

Guest
I did something so dumb.

I forgot to secure my fuel cap. I was at an unfamiliar airport, using a self service machine. The machine looked like it was from the dawn of time. The gallons dispensed gauge was for the most part INOP on the machine.

As a result, I got on and off my wing multiple times to check how much fuel had actually been dispensed. Since I got on and off multiple times on the same wing, I didn't fasten the cap the final time off that wing.

Even after walking around the aircraft, I did not spot the unsecured fuel cap. How? I have no clue. I was only on the ground for a few minutes so anything more than a general walk around felt like overkill. Apparently not!

I feel so dumb! I am disappointed in myself as I am a better pilot than that! I always do my best to take my time and be vigilant. I'm so confused how I let this happen.

I flew almost two hundred miles with (I am assuming) no fuel cap. Fuel calculations were normal. The wing was not covered in fuel. Always thought fuel would get sucked out of tank. Apparently not.

Anyone have any thoughts?

I am a young pilot, around 200 hours, working on my commercial license.

Aircraft is a high wing. I have well over 100 hours in type aircraft. However, most are from two years ago. Recent flight experience is in low wing.
 
(Not OP) But my cap was chained on and did not cause any damage to a C150F. No noticeable fuel lost either. Probably depends on the wing design. Cessna trainers may have inadvertently been design to be even more idiot proof than previously thought.

But don't try this at home. Or actually, it would be a cool test to put a GoPro up there and see what it looks like with the cap open during flight. I volunteer someone else.
 
Life is learning, as long as you lived.

No chain?

Maybe add it to a checklist.

I have a high wing. When away from my hangar, I check they are on and 100% shut after fueling (whether self-serve or fuel-truck).
 
The FBO at one airport I visited had a display case full of fuel caps that had been collected from the runway or the grass adjacent to the runway.

The Commanders have a flapper valve in the fuel filler - if you lose a cap that prevents file from being sucked out.
 
Last thing I do before hopping in the airplane is a final walk around and tug on the fuel caps to make sure they’re secured, as well as the oil filler door on the cowl being closed. Stuff happens, don’t beat yourself up over it, but next time, slow down. Things get overlooked when you’re in a hurry.
 
Not only did I leave a cap off the night before my checkride which my CFI discovered in the morning and put it on without telling me thankfully. But when I first started flying I ripped the ground strap off of the pump by forgetting to unclip it from the bottom of my wing . we've all done something bad. you learn by your mistakes , that's why checklists and protocol are what make Pilots safer. Don't get lazy!!!! Human nature will consume you.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk
 
Don't leave something until it's finished. For fueling, that means installing the cap and latching it before going to the next tank. Don't leave it for later, even if you are going to sump the tank, always complete what you start.

The plane I fly has a key to open the luggage door, the ignition key is on the same ring. While that door is open, the key is in the lock cylinder and only comes out when that door is secured and locked.

Oil access door, if the stick is not fully engaged, that door stays open. If it's open, I check the to make sure the stick is fully seated before it's closed.

Little things like this work well when that inevitable distraction happens.
 
One of my "Thank god it wasn't me" moments came when a King Air F-90 taxied by with out governor on board. Then stopped. Poor line guy had to run out and put the gas caps back on. He never put them back after fueling, and the pilot missed it too. Guess who saw it first?
 
Many years ago I was flying a cross country in the mid-west. I stopped and hurriedly got fuel. I took off and was flying towards a VOR that was about 20 minutes away, based on a small airfield. Just as I overflew the vor, I heard something, or maybe saw something move out of the corner of my eye, I'm not sure which, and looked to see one of my red-colored fuel caps was missing. I immediately landed at the small field where the VOR was based, hoping someone was there that might have an extra fuel cap. While landing, I caught a glimpse of something red colored go by that was on the runway. I stopped, taxied back, and I couldn't believe it, it was my fuel cap! Bulls eye! My luck doesn't normally run that good!
 
Similar, but different. Same self fueling situation. Unfamiliar with the machine, etc. The only thing I left behind was my credit card in the machine. It's a good thing that almost everyone is an honest person.
 
Leave the cap off a tank that has the rubber bladder, and the low pressure over the wing will pull all the fuel out as the bladder collapses under the suction. Cessna has an AD on the flush fuel caps on certain airplanes because of that. Just a leaking cap can do it.

And the collapsed bladder will hold the fuel sender float up so the gauge reads full. Neat, huh?
 
Country Flier said:
Many years ago I was flying a cross country in the mid-west. I stopped and hurriedly got fuel. I took off and was flying towards a VOR that was about 20 minutes away, based on a small airfield. Just as I overflew the vor, I heard something, or maybe saw something move out of the corner of my eye, I'm not sure which, and looked to see one of my red-colored fuel caps was missing. I immediately landed at the small field where the VOR was based, hoping someone was there that might have an extra fuel cap. While landing, I caught a glimpse of something red colored go by that was on the runway. I stopped, taxied back, and I couldn't believe it, it was my fuel cap! Bulls eye! My luck doesn't normally run that good!
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Apparently your fuel cap was a skydiver in a previous life.
 
I've only ever fueled 40-60 gal tanks, but I can't imagine walking away from a running fuel hose...especially on a high wing...especially multiple times.
Do they even have a holding mechanism? None of our local ones do or any that I've come across so far.
Maybe I'm doing it wrong.
 
Skyrys62 said:
I've only ever fueled 40-60 gal tanks, but I can't imagine walking away from a running fuel hose...especially on a high wing...especially multiple times.
Do they even have a holding mechanism? None of our local ones do or any that I've come across so far.
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In Canada, at least, it's illegal to have a latchable nozzle for aircraft fuelling.
 
Robert Helmick said:
Not only did I leave a cap off the night before my checkride which my CFI discovered in the morning and put it on without telling me thankfully. But when I first started flying I ripped the ground strap off of the pump by forgetting to unclip it from the bottom of my wing . we've all done something bad. you learn by your mistakes , that's why checklists and protocol are what make Pilots safer. Don't get lazy!!!! Human nature will consume you.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk
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MooneyDriver78 said:
I put fuel cap and oil filler door on my checklist.
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^^^^ This.

Create a "Refuel stop" checklist for yourself, and use it. When we do a walk around without looking for specific things, we are prone to miss small things. Add a BPI (Big Part Inspection) to your walk around and actively touch the things you are looking at.

BPI- 1 Engine and prop, 2 Wings, 3 tires. Then add your "touch" list... Baggage/Cargo door, Fuel caps, Oil dipstick and door, Passenger door.

There is a reason that military aviation has a check list for everything....and I mean everything. We have a checklists for all of our checklists.


Edit to add: And it happens to us all. No harm no foul. It will be something you don't forget from here on out.
 
Zeldman said:
You are not the first to do this, and you won't be the last.

Just wait 'til you leave a seatbelt hangin' out the door and have it make so much racket you will think something is stuck in the prop...:lol:
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Or forget to pull the chocks and can’t figure out why the plane won’t move. :rolleyes:
 
I landed late at night at an airport that had a non-functioning self sere. No sign or NOTAM. Tried to get the damn thing to pump for half an hour or so. Finally said it ain't working and found an airport 20 min away that had fuel (this is at about 4 am). Flew to airport with fuel, filled first tank and then went to 2nd tank and no cap... Realized that having never pumped at the last airport f'ed up my routine and I forgot to put on the cap. Flew back to airport with no self-serve. Expected to find cap at pump or at least on taxiway. No dice. Finally went out to the runway (still pitch black). Went about 100 yards and saw a white thing on the runway, which was my fuel cap. Ran out and grabbed it and had an uneventful flight after that.

I now look at both wings as part of my pre-launch checklist. Glad I have a low wing :)
 
Hang 4 said:
I landed late at night at an airport that had a non-functioning self sere. No sign or NOTAM. Tried to get the damn thing to pump for half an hour or so. Finally said it ain't working and found an airport 20 min away that had fuel (this is at about 4 am). Flew to airport with fuel, filled first tank and then went to 2nd tank and no cap... Realized that having never pumped at the last airport f'ed up my routine and I forgot to put on the cap. Flew back to airport with no self-serve. Expected to find cap at pump or at least on taxiway. No dice. Finally went out to the runway (still pitch black). Went about 100 yards and saw a white thing on the runway, which was my fuel cap. Ran out and grabbed it and had an uneventful flight after that.

I now look at both wings as part of my pre-launch checklist. Glad I have a low wing :)
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One time when I was instructing, I left my keys on the wing. 152. When we got back I realized what I had done. An old guy sitting in the sun at the FBO heard me talking about my keys and told me to go look where we rotated and you will find them. We jumped in the golf cart and went to where we rotated, and there they were.
 
I forgot my fuel caps only once. At the self-serve pumps a pair of young ladies with quite nice empenages walked by, quite unusual for the airport in general, not to mention the self serve.

If you lose them on the runway, the place to look is right about there you rotated.
 
Things like that happen. (Run over chocks, atc getting upset, hangar rash). Do it once and you’ll check every time you fly. You got that mistake out of the way and it won’t happen again.
 
LesGawlik said:
I forgot my fuel caps only once. At the self-serve pumps a pair of young ladies with quite nice empenages walked by, quite unusual for the airport in general, not to mention the self serve.

If you lose them on the runway, the place to look is right about there you rotated.
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Nice "empenages"? Were they those modern girls that require a special pronoun?
 
A year or two ago the cover of the digital edition of the AOPA Pilot magazine was a beautiful air-to-air photo of a Pilatus Porter turboprop on floats, photographed from above. The fuel cap was clearly visible hanging by its chain from the open fuel port on the right wing. When the print edition of the magazine came out, the cap and open fuel port had been Photoshopped out. :oops::rolleyes:

About a dozen years ago I was flying home from an Idaho backcountry camping trip in my Sport Cub. I stopped for fuel at McCall, Idaho, and managed to leave a gas cap off. No safety chains, so the cap was lost. My first indication of an issue was the fact that the fuel level in the left tank sight gauge was going down at an alarming rate, while the right tank remained full. This was odd, because the two tanks usually fed evenly with the selector in the 'both' position.

I landed at Joseph, Oregon, to investigate. To my surprise, it was the cap on the right tank that was missing. Then it occurred to me -- fuel was siphoning out of the open right tank, and the suction (and a good morning to you, Dr. Bernoulli) was pulling fuel from the left tank through the vent line to the right tank, which appeared to remain full.
 
I saw a fuel cap at the hold short a few years ago, not mine. I see extra fuel caps around the refueling site at times. Stuff happens, be methodical, if in doubt, check again.

I was flying with the wife the other day, took a peek left & right. She asked what I was looking at. I said I just like to see the fuel caps in position.
 
Pilawt said:
-- fuel was siphoning out of the open right tank, and the suction (and a good morning to you, Dr. Bernoulli) was pulling fuel from the left tank through the vent line to the right tank, which appeared to remain full.
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Once the vent line is above the fuel level in the emptying tank, it can't transfer fuel. The fuel travels down through the line to the selector in the Both position, through it, and up into the uncapped tank.
 
Zeldman said:
You are not the first to do this, and you won't be the last.

Just wait 'til you leave a seatbelt hangin' out the door and have it make so much racket you will think something is stuck in the prop...:lol:
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guilty of this. thankfully figured out the racket before take off
 
Zeldman said:
One time when I was instructing, I left my keys on the wing. 152. When we got back I realized what I had done. An old guy sitting in the sun at the FBO heard me talking about my keys and told me to go look where we rotated and you will find them. We jumped in the golf cart and went to where we rotated, and there they were.
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I left a fuel cap "sitting" in the fuel filler opening without securing it once. I saw it depart the airplane on takeoff, mentally noted where it had come off relative to the liftoff point, circled and landed (while watching fuel spill back across the wing - worse at high AOA on an RV), and landed.

While I was contemplating how to get home from Illinois without a fuel cap, we walked the runway and I found it at the side of the runway.

It was slightly scratched and dented, but works just fine. I've kept it in service as a reminder.
 
There was no fault to the pilots in this case, it is simply a bad design. The cap on the 48 Cessna has a (sump)for a better word that will hold about 3 oz of water that will leak into the tank.

we will investigate farther after the Holliday.
 
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