Accidents/NTSB

My airplane has wingtip-mounted fuel tanks, installed under a supplemental type certificate (STC). In many ways, they’ve transformed and improved the machine by adding greater loading flexibility, thanks in part to a gross-weight increase. What drag they produce isn’t noticeable, and the additional endurance means the airplane is faster over some trips than it was […]

There were no fatalities among the 143 people aboard a Miami Air Boeing 737 that went off the end of the runway at Naval Air Station Jacksonville Friday night. The plane was on a flight from Naval Station Guantanamo Bay in Cuba when it ended up in shallow water in the St. John’s River about […]

Test pilots on the Boeing 737 MAX weren’t provided key details on how the MCAS stability system functioned and apparently weren’t aware of its aggressive trim capability. The Wall Street Journal reports that MAX flight test pilots were also unaware that MCAS relied on data from a single angle-of-attack sensor. The report follows a revelation […]

When Boeing finally digs itself out of the self-inflicted PR disaster of the 737 MAX story—if it ever does—I wonder how it will be graded on handling the crisis. I wonder, but I’m kinda disposed to think it will become a textbook case of how not to behave in the searing glare of catastrophic bad […]

Southwest Airlines, Boeing’s biggest customer for the troubled 737 MAX, said this week that the airplane maker’s documentation incorrectly claimed that its aircraft had operable angle-of-attack disagree warning lights. But Boeing informed Southwest that the AoA function was actually inoperative only after the Lion Air crash in Indonesia last October. Even as Boeing finishes software […]

Addressing shareholders in Chicago Monday, Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg spoke to reporters about the 737 MAX’s troubled MCAS (Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System). “The MCAS system as originally designed met our design and safety analysis criteria,” he said. When asked if the MCAS was the cause of both Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines accidents, Muilenburg sidestepped […]

AVweb’sGeneral Aviation Accident Bulletinis taken from the pages of our sister publication,Aviation Safetymagazine. All the reports listed here are preliminary and include only initial factual findings about crashes. You can learn more about the final probable cause on the NTSB’s website atwww.ntsb.gov. Final reports appear about a year after the accident, although some take longer. […]

A Bellanca Viking that crashed mysteriously overnight this week at the Henderson City, Kentucky, airport had cocaine and cash on board, according to local authorities. Police say that the two aboard, Barry Hill, 47, and George Tucker, 48, both from Sanford, North Carolina, were carrying a duffel bag of cash and suspected cocaine. “Investigators believe […]

The pilot walked away (after being helped to the ground) but left authorities in western Idaho to figure out how to retrieve his airplane from the top of a 60-foot fir tree. John Gregory took off last week from McCall, Idaho, and lost power in his Super Cub. He headed for a clearing but a […]

LAX 24L: A Runway With A Tragic History GREAT, well written article by Myron Nelson regarding the 24L accident at LAX. As a retired major airline captain with 35 years of experience flying into LAX, I could relate completely…Well done. Tom Rosen Great recap of the runway 24 L indecent. I remember it well because […]