WPR10LA313 · de Havilland DHC-1
de Havilland DHC-1 · Accident: fuel contamination during initial climb
From Vaughan Ranch Airfield (WN13) to Vaughan Ranch Airfield (WN13)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR10LA313
- 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
- Unknown
- 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
de Havilland DHC-1
- Aircraft type
- de Havilland DHC-1
- 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
- N6540C
- Operator
- John Geyman
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Vaughan Ranch Airfield (WN13), Port Orchard, WATo Vaughan Ranch Airfield (WN13), Port Orchard, WA
- 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
- Initial climb
- Defining eventThe 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
- Fuel contamination
- 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
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
- Aircraft › Fluids/miscellaneous hardware
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot reported that he performed several engine runs prior to departure as the airplane had not flown in approximately 15 months. After departure, and about 400 to 500 feet above the ground, the engine lost power without warning. The pilot initiated a forced landing through tall trees to a heavily vegetated field. The airplane's engine separated from its mount and the empennage was bent approximately 30 degrees to the left. Both wings and the fuselage were bent and wrinkled. The airplane's maintenance records indicated that a conditional inspection had been signed off just before the accident flight. A postaccident examination of the airplane was performed by a Federal Aviation Administration inspector and a mechanic. During the inspection, a mixture of fuel and water was found in an unsumpable gascolator located on the firewall. The owner of the airplane reported that the airplane had been parked outside for several days prior to the accident flight, and during this time it rained heavily in the area.
Probable cause
A loss of engine power during initial climb due to water contamination in the fuel.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR10LA313
- Event ID
- 20100624X83927
- Case number
- WPR10LA313
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 2010-06-24.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 2747b4700d8b8405ab9cc5f47414056beabe5b4532bc30476cd6100a06d82f55; retrieved 2026-09-15T14:30:02.002Z.