NYC87LA256 · Cessna 310N
Cessna 310N · Accident: fire/explosion while standing
From Williamsport Regional Airport (IPT) to Philadelphia International Airport (PHL)
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC87LA256
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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
Cessna 310N
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 310
- 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
- N4166Q
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Williamsport Regional Airport (IPT)To Philadelphia International Airport (PHL), Philadelphia, PA
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- Standing · engine(s) start-up
- 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/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
- Fluid, fuel › Fire
- Fuel system, strainer › Leak
- Pilot in command › Preflight planning/preparation, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
AFTER LANDING, THE CARGO WAS UNLOADED & THE ACFT WAS PREPARED FOR DEPARTURE. THE PLT STATED THE PREFLIGHT WAS NORMAL & SATISFACTORY. HE RPRTD THAT WHEN THE LEFT ENG WAS STARTED, HE HEARD A LOUD 'POP' & OBSERVED 'FLAME TRACES AND SMOKE.' HE IMMEDIATELY SHUT DOWN THE ENG & EXITED THE ACFT TO INVESTIGATE. HE FOUND THAT ABOUT 4' OF THE OUTBOARD, LEADING EDGE SECTION OF THE LEFT WING HAD EXPLODED & BUCKLED. HE STATED THAT FLAMES & SMOKE WERE VISIBLE & IMMEDIATELY EXTINGUISHED. THE PLT RPRTD THE LEFT FUEL STRAINER CORK GASKET WAS FAULTY. DRY FUEL STAINS WERE FOUND ON THE BOTTOM OF THE LEFT WING, LEFT FLAP, LEFT ENG NACELLE & LEFT LANDING GEAR.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC87LA256
- Event ID
- 20001213X32197
- Case number
- NYC87LA256
- 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: 05cea0313cce042c47ec0029dc6f4d8ba63b3002724e026d86ed200189a548ad; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:37:54.756Z.