SEA99FA060 · Beech 36
Beech 36 · Accident: explosion during takeoff
From Portland International Airport (PDX) to an unrecorded destination
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA99FA060
- 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
- 0 · 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
Beech 36
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 36
- 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
- N6222V
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Portland International Airport (PDX)To not recorded
- 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
- Takeoff · roll/run
- 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
- Explosion
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
During the takeoff roll, the pilot heard a loud explosion and the aircraft violently yawed to the left. The aircraft veered off the runway and came to rest in a grassy area between the runway and the taxiway. Examination of the aircraft's fuel system revealed evidence of a preexisting fuel leak. Blue streaking and staining, consistent in color with 100 low lead aviation fuel, was noted on the ventral surfaces of the aircraft. Examination of the aircraft's fuel bladder revealed that the plastic interconnect nipple for the vent line, and the plastic interconnect nipple for the fuel return line, located at the distal end of the aircraft's fuel bladder, were fractured. Further examination of the fuel bladder revealed approximately 20 preexisting holes in the bladder's fabric. The aircraft's maintenance logbook indicated that the aircraft was equipped with a strobe light kit. Examination of the strobe light system revealed that the installation of the strobe kit was not in accordance with the manufacture's installation instructions. Instead, the wiring harness for the strobe light was routed parallel to a stringer, between the wing ribs and the skin of the aircraft. Examination of the wiring revealed that the wire's insulation was chafed, cut and discolored. The discoloration of the wiring was indicative of arcing.
Probable cause
Improper installation of the strobe light system. Factors include a leak in the fuel bladder and electrical arcing.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA99FA060
- Event ID
- 20001212X18883
- Case number
- SEA99FA060
- 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: 1b3ffaa02f9d5e37e357fffbc07b55844a6e3734fd54f83d0a4126961ebd1bd6; retrieved 2026-09-22T15:17:36.311Z.