Narrative:

I remember being a little tired after a long week. We work long hours away from home and it can wear on a guy. I also remember being excited that it was almost the weekend. Everything was running on time that morning and the weather was decent with mild temps and about 1600 overcast. With plenty of time to do a preflight and obtain a clearance and after a small issue with a knot in a cargo strap; I taxied out and completed a run up and departed. [The aircraft] seemed to be a great airplane and I had flown it several times that week. I did notice what I considered a lower than average oil pressure and noted it on the trend the previous day 90-91 lbs in cruise; which is well within parameters for operations. The flight was a canned flight plan with an altitude of 7;000 feet MSL and I had leveled off. The autopilot was flying the plane and I had been handed off from tower to departure and then handed over to center. I had even called the company with my departure times. I remember anxiously waiting for some winds aloft information to pop up on the sometimes slow garmin gmx200. I sometimes will request a higher altitude for a better ground speed.what happened next; caught me so off guard and startled me that I didn't do anything for a few seconds except retard the throttle. A loud explosion; equivalent to a shot gun blast and a winding down sound; kind of like a jake brake on a big truck. Every emergency procedure I had ever trained for became all jumbled up in my head! With little or no ng% (engine gas generator speed) I didn't want to but I pulled the fuel condition lever over the gate to off. The controller wasted no time in giving me a quick vector to a nearby airport and I also managed to put it in the GPS. I had to get back on the gauges as my caravan descended into the clouds for what must have been about a minute and a half. It was very dark below the cloud layer but I could see the surface. At one point I had picked out a gravel road but talked myself out of it thinking about telephone poles. I never did see that airport that was still 4 miles away I will say the radar altimeter was very useful by letting me know it was time to land [off airport]. A headwind helped with the 1800 lbs of cargo. This was not easy to write and I feel very lucky considering the variables and terrain.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: C208 pilot reported an engine failure at 7000 feet followed by an off airport landing.

Narrative: I remember being a little tired after a long week. We work long hours away from home and it can wear on a guy. I also remember being excited that it was almost the weekend. Everything was running on time that morning and the weather was decent with mild temps and about 1600 overcast. With plenty of time to do a preflight and obtain a clearance and after a small issue with a knot in a cargo strap; I taxied out and completed a run up and departed. [The aircraft] seemed to be a great airplane and I had flown it several times that week. I did notice what I considered a lower than average oil pressure and noted it on the trend the previous day 90-91 lbs in cruise; which is well within parameters for operations. The flight was a canned flight plan with an altitude of 7;000 feet MSL and I had leveled off. The autopilot was flying the plane and I had been handed off from tower to departure and then handed over to center. I had even called the company with my departure times. I remember anxiously waiting for some winds aloft information to pop up on the sometimes slow Garmin gmx200. I sometimes will request a higher altitude for a better ground speed.What happened next; caught me so off guard and startled me that I didn't do anything for a few seconds except retard the throttle. A loud explosion; equivalent to a shot gun blast and a winding down sound; kind of like a Jake brake on a big truck. Every emergency procedure I had ever trained for became all jumbled up in my head! With little or no NG% (Engine Gas Generator Speed) I didn't want to but I pulled the fuel condition lever over the gate to OFF. The controller wasted no time in giving me a quick vector to a nearby airport and I also managed to put it in the GPS. I had to get back on the gauges as my Caravan descended into the clouds for what must have been about a minute and a half. It was very dark below the cloud layer but I could see the surface. At one point I had picked out a gravel road but talked myself out of it thinking about telephone poles. I never did see that airport that was still 4 miles away I will say the radar altimeter was very useful by letting me know it was time to land [off airport]. A headwind helped with the 1800 lbs of cargo. This was not easy to write and I feel very lucky considering the variables and terrain.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site 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.