WPR15IA263 · Cessna T206H
Aero-Graphics Cessna T206H · Incident: fire/smoke (non-impact) during initial climb
From Idaho Falls Regional Airport (IDA) to Idaho Falls Regional Airport (IDA)
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR15IA263
- 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
- Incident
- 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
Cessna T206H
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 206
- 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
- N7269T
- Operator
- Aero-Graphics
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Idaho Falls Regional Airport (IDA), Idaho Falls, IDTo Idaho Falls Regional Airport (IDA), Idaho Falls, ID
- Aircraft age
- About 16 years (built 1999)
- 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
- Fire/smoke (non-impact)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Minor
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
During initial climb and about 200 ft above ground level, the passenger observed smoke, which then rapidly filled the cabin. The pilot immediately turned the airplane toward the runway and subsequently performed a forced landing.
Examination revealed that the airplane experienced an in-flight fire due to the separation of the engine's turbocharger wastegate overboard exhaust tailpipe from the turbocharger housing. The hot gases from the exhaust system subsequently burned through the battery's electrical cable insulation, which resulted in arcing, a short circuit, and fire. The airplane manufacturer had issued a service bulletin (SB) 16 years before the incident, which recommended installing a tailpipe lanyard to prevent the separation of the tailpipe.
About 6 months before the incident, the airplane experienced a similar separation of the tailpipe. The damage was less severe, and it was limited to the battery and its electrical cables. After that event, the tailpipe clamp and gaskets were replaced, but the owner did not comply with the SB. No lanyard was found on the airplane, and no record was found indicating that the owner had complied with the SB at any time. However, the airplane was operating under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91; therefore, compliance with the SB was not mandatory. Although complying with the SB was not mandatory for this airplane's operations, the owner should have complied with the SB to ensure the continued safe operation of the airplane.
Probable cause
An in-flight fire during initial climb due to the separation of the engine's turbocharger wastegate overboard exhaust tailpipe. Contributing to the accident was the owner's decision to not comply with a service bulletin that addressed the tailpipe separation.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR15IA263
- Event ID
- 20150921X05442
- Case number
- WPR15IA263
- 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: investigation status, coordinates. 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: 94032c02976c272b9b20eab3db224b48f238384b0fc4c6bbed8ee0209a3b6ce4; retrieved 2026-09-16T02:47:27.492Z.