The probable cause of the undercowl in-flight engine fire was the insufficient installation torque of the bolts that secure the fuel manifold cover to the fuel manifold. Engine vibrations and fuel pressure cycles caused the bolts to gradually loosen further until one bolt lost all its tightening torque and fell out. The internal fuel pressure then forced open the fuel manifold cover at the location of the missing bolt, causing a gap between the two mating surfaces which allowed fuel to push past the integral packing, resulting in a fuel leak onto the hot engine cases where it ignited resulting in a fire.
N248WN
2006 BOEING 737-7H4
Fixed wing multi engine · Turbo-fan · Standard
1 NTSB record
for this tail number. See the full record below.
Registration
Airframe
Powerplant
Live Flight Status
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Transponder & Tracking
The hex code is the aircraft's ICAO 24-bit address, broadcast by its ADS-B transponder. It is the key used to match live position reports to this registration.
NTSB Accident & Incident Record
Dec 25, 2010
Incident
San Francisco, CA
InjuriesNone
Phase of Flight-
Conditions-
OperationFAR 121
Probable Cause
NTSB ENG11IA011