On a bitterly cold eastern winter morning, I was scheduled to fly a rented Cessna 152. The aircraft was parked on an incline sloping to the left. During the preflight, I climbed up on the fuel step—with my good knee—and checked the left tank. It was full all the way to the cap—not surprising because of the crossfeed from the right tank.
I didn’t bother to check the right tank, because of my knee problems. I had 12 gallons usable in the left tank for a one-hour flight—good enough. I figured that the crossover would balance things out in flight. I completed the walk-around, sumping both tanks in the process. My biggest fear that day was that the engine wouldn’t turn over.
Startup, taxi, and runup were uneventful, although the right tank gauge read zero. Out of habit, I flew once around the pattern with a takeoff and landing before departing the airport.
I proceeded six miles to the offshore practice area at 3,000 feet for some stall recovery practice. After 0.4 of an hour on the Hobbs, I turned toward the airport, started my descent from 2,600 feet, and crossed a one-mile frozen bay.
Four and a half miles from the airport, the engine sputtered and lost rpm. My first reaction was: carburetor heat, mixture in, throttle in, primer in. The engine continued to sputter.
I noticed that I could get spurts of rpm by “goosing” the throttle. Time was suspended. I banked left and right looking for an off-field landing site and saw densely populated suburban housing for miles; no highways, only narrow streets; and a two-mile stretch of frozen inlet to the right. I was four miles from the airport, too low for distance visibility.
Without a landing option, and with around 1,000 feet of altitude, I wasn’t giving up on the airplane. The airport was barely a smudge in the distance. I continued the rapid throttle-pumping and kept zooming the prop—about once per second. As long as I had ignition, I’d just keep zooming. I didn’t declare “Mayday.” I was still making progress to the airport, nose on the horizon, flying by gut feel.
After an excruciatingly long time the airport was close, with Runway 33 in sight. My anxiety subsided enough to feel the fatigue in my right arm. I must have pumped hundreds of times. At a one-mile final I announced a final approach with an engine problem, anticipating a tow on landing. They responded, “Are you declaring an emergency?” I had the field made and could even start lowering flaps. I thought, Do I really need fire engines at this point? I keyed the mic: “Negative.”
After an uneventful landing I coasted to the nearest taxiway. Miraculously, after cleaning up the aircraft, when I advanced the throttle it responded with full power.
Unicom asked if I needed assistance. I declined since the throttle response was now normal and taxied to the FBO. On the way to the ramp, stopping for ground traffic, the prop stopped. Cranking the starter it spun up and I taxied to the tiedown.
At the FBO I wrote up the pilot squawk sheet. They took the 150 out of service for a thorough inspection and test, but found no anomalies with the aircraft. They could only conjecture that something got in the fuel line and eventually cleared itself out, possibly induced by the stall practice.
Upon reflection I made some critical errors, but learned something else. I should have declared an emergency when I couldn’t restore full power. I found out later that you can legally undeclare an emergency if the situation improves.
I failed to monitor my airspeed or altitude. I might have gained additional margin by maintaining best glidespeed.
After consulting Google Maps, I determined that I had passed a golf course and a sports field directly under my flight path. I might have needed those options if the prop zooming technique failed. I gave up precious altitude by a premature descent six miles from the airport.
Assuming the engine problem is not electrical or mechanical, you may be able to use the throttle to force fuel into a sputtering engine, buying some thrust that can translate into life-saving altitude and time.
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