ATL95FA007 · Piper PA-23-250
Piper PA-23-250 · Accident: fire en route
From Dothan Regional Airport (DHN) to Jonesboro, GA (no airport)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL95FA007
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 2 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Piper PA-23-250
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-23
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N999BW
- Operator
- Mann, Nathaniel E. · private individual
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Dothan Regional Airport (DHN), Dothan, ALTo Jonesboro, GA (no airport)
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- En route · climb to cruise
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Fire
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Exhaust system, clamp › Separation
- Exhaust system, manifold/pipe › Missing
- Other maintenance personnel › Maintenance, installation, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
MAINTENANCE HAD BEEN PERFORMED ON THE ENGINE TURBO-CHARGERS & EXHAUST SYSTEMS SEVERAL DAYS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT FLIGHT. AFTER DEPARTURE, THE PILOT REPORTED THAT THE LEFT ENGINE LOST POWER & HE ELECTED TO RETURN TO THE AIRPORT. A WITNESS REPORTED SEEING THE AIRPLANE HEADING TOWARD THE AIRPORT WITH AN ORANGE GLOW UNDER THE LEFT WING ABOUT FOUR FEET OUTBOARD OF THE FUSELAGE. THE WITNESS SAID THERE WAS A LOUD POP, THE LEFT WING SEPARATED FROM THE AIRPLANE, & THE PLANE FELL TO THE GROUND. INSPECTION REVEALED EXTENSIVE FIRE DAMAGE IN THE AREA OF THE LEFT WHEEL WELL & SPAR, BEHIND THE FIREWALL, IMMEDIATELY AFT OF THE TURBO-CHARGER EXHAUST. FUEL LINES IN THE WHEEL WELL AREA HAD BURNED AWAY. THE LEFT ENGINE TURBOCHARGER TAIL PIPE & MARMON CONNECTOR CLAMP WERE MISSING. THE ENGINES HAD BEEN EQUIPPED WITH AIRESEARCH TURBOCHARGERS IN ACCORDANCE WITH STC SA909WE.
Probable cause
FAILURE OF MAINTENANCE PERSONNEL TO PROPERLY INSTALL THE MARMON CLAMP ON THE DISCHARGE SIDE OF THE TURBOCHARGER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL95FA007
- Event ID
- 20001206X02374
- Case number
- ATL95FA007
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 7dfe6e43331020c48a61d5e8bdc5b29d67a11d65591132d31756a323053862fe; retrieved 2026-09-20T23:58:09.444Z.