ERA25FA246 · Cessna 441
Meander Air Cessna 441 · Accident during takeoff
From an unrecorded airport to Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport (BZN)
Event
- NTSB case
- ERA25FA246
- 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
- Ongoing
- API-reported fatalities
- 6 · 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 441
- Aircraft type
- Cessna 441
- 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
- N441LS
- Operator
- Meander Air
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport (BZN), Bozeman, MT
- Aircraft age
- About 41 years (built 1984)
- 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
- 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
- Unknown or undetermined
- 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
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
On June 29, 2025, about 0654 eastern daylight time, a Cessna 441, N441LS, was destroyed when it was involved in an accident near Warren, Ohio. The airline transport pilot and five passengers were fatally injured. The airplane was operated as a Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations personal flight. According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Chronological Summary of Flight Communications, the pilot contacted local control (LC), which was combined with ground control and the pilot was issued an instrument flight rules clearance from Youngstown/Warren Regional Airport (YNG), Youngstown/Warren, Ohio, to Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport (BZN), Bozeman, Montana, which was correctly read back. The flight was issued taxi instructions to runway 32 and about 0651, the local controller issued a takeoff clearance from runway 32, including departure instructions to turn left direct to the destination and gave the wind as from 090° at 4 knots. Video with sound from the “Terminal Ramp” security camera at YNG captured an increase in sound from the accident airplane about 0652, while video without sound from the military side of YNG captured the airplane rotating just prior to taxiway C, with the estimated point of rotation approximately 4,400 to 4,500 feet down the 9,003-foot runway. The aircraft then climbed to an estimated altitude of about 100 feet above ground level before leveling off and continuing along the runway heading at a consistent altitude until it was no longer visible on camera. According to Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast (ADS-B) data, targets were noted during almost the entire takeoff roll and continued to very close proximity to the first identified broken tree limb on the ground associated with the impact sequence. A review of reported barometric altitude data while airborne compared to while on the runway revealed only about 100 ft of altitude gain during the entire flight. Security camera video from a farm located .40 nm nearly due east from the accident site depicted the airplane emerging from behind trees flying at a low altitude in a westerly direction in a nearly nose-level and wings level attitude. The video with sound depicted the airplane flying for about 7 seconds before going out of view behind trees. Witnesses who were located about 1.5 nm northwest from the accident site reported hearing the sound of an airplane initiating its takeoff roll. They then heard a noticeable pitch change in the engine sound. They reported that the airplane never appeared above the tree line and that the engine was "roaring." Moments later, they heard the sound of trees breaking, followed by a loud explosion, and observed smoke rising from the area where the airplane had gone down. Video from the military side of YNG also captured smoke from the postcrash fire. The airplane impacted trees in a heavily-wooded area which separated a major portion of the left wing. The wreckage, consisting of the fuselage, inboard section of left wing, right wing, aft empennage with horizontal and vertical stabilizers, came to rest inverted. The cockpit, cabin, right wing, and separated section of the left wing were heavily damaged by the postcrash fire. The Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System (EGPWS) was retained for readout by the manufacturer, while the throttle quadrant, annunciator panel, and inboard section of the right elevator torque tube were retained for examination by the NTSB Materials Laboratory. Both engines, and propellers were also retained for further examination at each manufacturer’s facility with NTSB oversight.
Verbatim NTSB factual narrative from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ERA25FA246
- Event ID
- 20250629200407
- Case number
- ERA25FA246
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Source notes (5)
- 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: 686af4657352080acba04ef2209fc1aa8e8ecea533ae07a837059d6c647a02f8; retrieved 2026-09-15T09:06:08.068Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: damage. The narrative states the airplane "was destroyed when it was involved in an accident".