Narrative:

I was conducting an introductory flight lesson with two people on board; three including myself. The temperature at the field was around 96 degrees fahrenheit. I had already conducted an intro flight on the piper warrior about 30 minutes prior. I made four attempts at starting the engine as per the pilots operating handbook for warm start with about 30 second breaks in between the first two attempts. After the third attempt I waited about 5 minutes before attempting one last time. Before I tried for the fourth time I explained to the passengers that it was a really warm day and that if the engine didn't start they had the option of waiting for later on in the day when the temperatures cooled down or they could reschedule for another day. On the fourth attempt just as the first three I performed a warm start as per the poh. The engine failed to start so I began the normal shutdown procedure following the checklist on my lap which is taken from the poh of the aircraft. As I was getting ready to exit the aircraft I noticed black smoke coming from the nose of the airplane. The poh recommends to attempt to start the engine in order to put out the fire. Because I had made 4 attempts to start the engine and failed; as pilot in command I decided to complete the shutdown and shutoff the fuel selector and initiated an evacuation to get the passengers off the airplane. I commanded them to release seat belts and get out. I immediately exited and assisted the passengers off the plane and moved them to a safe distance away from the airplane. I turned around and another person with halon extinguisher trying to put the fire out but the halon didn't have enough to put the fire out. I then grabbed the halon from the back seat of the airplane and gave it to the person that was helping me put the fire out. The fire was immediately put out with the second halon. The entire incident took about 10 seconds from when I noticed the smoke to when the fire was put out. The fire truck came a few minutes later and splashed the airplane with water to make sure the fire was out. Though I hope I don't have another incident I learned I should have taken names of everyone involved including the people who helped me put the fire out and anyone I spoke to. These were questions the FAA asked me which I did not have much detail to respond.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: PA28 instructor pilot reported an engine fire while trying to start the engine on a hot day. The fire occurred on the fourth attempted start an was put out with two halon bottles.

Narrative: I was conducting an introductory flight lesson with two people on board; three including myself. The temperature at the field was around 96 degrees Fahrenheit. I had already conducted an intro flight on the Piper warrior about 30 minutes prior. I made four attempts at starting the engine as per the pilots operating handbook for warm start with about 30 second breaks in between the first two attempts. After the third attempt I waited about 5 minutes before attempting one last time. Before I tried for the fourth time I explained to the passengers that it was a really warm day and that if the engine didn't start they had the option of waiting for later on in the day when the temperatures cooled down or they could reschedule for another day. On the fourth attempt just as the first three I performed a warm start as per the POH. The engine failed to start so I began the normal shutdown procedure following the checklist on my lap which is taken from the POH of the aircraft. As I was getting ready to exit the aircraft I noticed black smoke coming from the nose of the airplane. The POH recommends to attempt to start the engine in order to put out the fire. Because I had made 4 attempts to start the engine and failed; as pilot in command I decided to complete the shutdown and shutoff the fuel selector and initiated an evacuation to get the passengers off the airplane. I commanded them to release seat belts and get out. I immediately exited and assisted the passengers off the plane and moved them to a safe distance away from the airplane. I turned around and another person with halon extinguisher trying to put the fire out but the halon didn't have enough to put the fire out. I then grabbed the halon from the back seat of the airplane and gave it to the person that was helping me put the fire out. The fire was immediately put out with the second halon. The entire incident took about 10 seconds from when I noticed the smoke to when the fire was put out. The fire truck came a few minutes later and splashed the airplane with water to make sure the fire was out. Though I hope I don't have another incident I learned I should have taken names of everyone involved including the people who helped me put the fire out and anyone I spoke to. These were questions the FAA asked me which I did not have much detail to respond.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.