A BE60 lost oil pressure in its left engine. The engine was shut down. Flight crew did not declare e...

Attributes
ACN	980427
Time
Date	201111
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.VOR
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Duke 60
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Cruise
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	Engine
Person 1
Function	First Officer Pilot Not Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Flight Instructor Flight Crew Flight Engineer Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP) Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Multiengine
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 35 Flight Crew Total 5800 Flight Crew Type 45
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical

Narrative:

At cruise altitude of 5;000 ft noted gradual decrease in left engine oil pressure. [We] elected to shut down left engine and feather prop. No emergency was declared nor existed. Asked for and got vectors to return to home airport. Continued single engine; made visual approach and landed single engine. If conditions had warranted; we could have restarted left engine. After landing; [we] found out that approach had declared an emergency. We had told ATC that we were not declaring an emergency. Post flight inspection showed four quarts of oil remained in left engine. Preliminary inspection indicated possible oil cooler failure.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A BE60 lost oil pressure in its left engine. The engine was shut down. Flight crew did not declare emergency; but returned to departure airport where ATC did.

Narrative: At cruise altitude of 5;000 FT noted gradual decrease in left engine oil pressure. [We] elected to shut down left engine and feather prop. No emergency was declared nor existed. Asked for and got vectors to return to home airport. Continued single engine; made visual approach and landed single engine. If conditions had warranted; we could have restarted left engine. After landing; [we] found out that Approach had declared an emergency. We had told ATC that we were not declaring an emergency. Post flight inspection showed four quarts of oil remained in left engine. Preliminary inspection indicated possible oil cooler failure.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.