ATL89MA123 · Beech 200
Beech 200 · Accident: fire en route
From Pensacola International Airport (PNS) to DeKalb Peachtree Airport (PDK)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL89MA123
- 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
- 3 · 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Beech 200
- Aircraft type
- Beechcraft 200
- 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
- N30PC
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Pensacola International Airport (PNS), Pensacola, FLTo DeKalb Peachtree Airport (PDK), Atlanta, GA
- 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
- Copilot/second pilot › Physical impairment(other toxic)
- Fuselage, cabin › Fire
- Fuselage, crew compartment › Smoke
- Pilot in command › Physical impairment(other toxic)
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE AIRCRAFT WAS ROUTINELY FLOWN TO PENSACOLA TO PICKUP A GULF POWER EXECUTIVE FOR A FLIGHT TO ATLANTA. THE PAX HAD 4 BAGS, 2 PLACED IN THE AFT BAGGAGE AREA BY THE GROUND CREW, THE OTHER 2 CARRIED ONBOARD BY THE PAX. AFTER TAKEOFF THE CVR RECORDED THE PAX STATING THAT THERE WAS A FIRE. THE FIRE IN THE AFT CABIN AREA WAS CONFIRMED BY THE 1ST OFFICER. AN EMERG WAS DECLARED TO THE PNS ATCT. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE AIRCRAFT WAS SEEN DESCENDING OUT OF THE OVERCAST STREAMING DARK SMOKE BEHIND IT. THE AIRCRAFT IMPACTED AN APARTMENT COMPLEX AND A POST CRASH FIRE DESTROYED IT. NO EVIDENCE OF A LIGHTNING STRIKE, AIRCRAFT SYSTEM MALFUNCTION, OR INCENDIARY DEVICE WAS FOUND DURING THE INVESTIGATION. FORENSIC CHEMICAL TESTS SHOWED TRACES OF HYDROCHLORIC AND SULPHURIC ACID ON PAX ARTICLES BUT NONE ON THE CABIN INTERIOR. METALLURGICAL EXAM OF BROKEN FUEL LINE SHOWED OVERLOAD FAILURE AND POST HEAT DISTRESS. THE INTERIOR OF THE COCKPIT WINDOWS WERE SEVERELY SOOTED. THE FLIGHT CREW DID NOT DON AVAILABLE OXYGEN MASKS.
Probable cause
AN IN FLIGHT CABIN FIRE OF UNDETERMINED ORIGIN, AND SMOKE (TOXIC CONDITION) IN THE CREW COMPARTMENT, WHICH RESULTED IN PHYSICAL IMPAIRMENT OF THE FLIGHT CREW.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL89MA123
- Event ID
- 20001213X28041
- Case number
- ATL89MA123
- 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: 81c5d5399268eefbad9431fceb8ca8154a4924248c080d4e8cde6b02617628d5; retrieved 2026-09-21T03:21:03.972Z.