Seconds From Disaster - Racing the Storm (American Airlines Flight 1420)
- 6 years ago
American Airlines Flight 1420 was a flight from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) to Little Rock National Airport in the United States. On June 1, 1999, the McDonnell Douglas MD-82 operating for Flight 1420 overran the runway upon landing in Little Rock and crashed. Eleven of the 145 people aboard, the captain and ten passengers, were killed in the crash.
The aircraft involved in the incident was a McDonnell Douglas MD-82 (registration N215AA), a derivative of the McDonnell Douglas DC-9 and part of the McDonnell Douglas MD-80 series of aircraft. It was delivered new to American Airlines in 1983, and had been operated continuously by the airline since, accumulating a total of 49,136 flight hours. The aircraft was equipped with Pratt & Whitney JT8D-217C turbofan jet engines.
The aircraft was equipped with X band weather radar, which is susceptible to attenuation during heavy precipitation, and did not have an attenuation alert to warn the flight crew of system impairment during heavy rainfall. The radar weather system had a forward-looking design that offered the flight crew only a limited field of view in front of the aircraft.
The aircraft touched down on Runway 4R at 23:50:20. About 2 seconds after the wheels touched down, First Officer Origel stated: "We're down. We're sliding!" Because the pilots failed to arm the autospoiler, the spoilers did not deploy automatically on landing, and the flight crew did not deploy them manually. Spoilers disrupt the airflow over the wings and prevent them from generating lift. That causes the plane's weight to be borne by the landing gear. About 65 percent of Flight 1420's weight would have been supported by the plane's landing gear if the spoilers are deployed, but without the spoilers this number dropped to only 15 percent. With the light loading of the landing gear, the aircraft's brakes were ineffective at slowing down the plane, which continued down the runway at high speed. Directional control was lost when Captain Buschmann applied too much reverse thrust, which reduced the effectiveness of the plane's rudder and vertical stabilizer.
The aircraft continued past the end of the runway, traveling another 800 feet and striking a security fence and an ILS localizer array. The aircraft then collided with a structure built to support the landing lights for runway 22L, which extended out into the Arkansas River. Such structures are usually frangible, that is, designed to shear off on impact, but because the approach lights were located on the unstable river bank, they were firmly anchored. The collision with the nonfrangible structure crushed the airplane's nose and destroyed the left side of the plane's fuselage, from the cockpit back to the first two rows of coach seating. The impact broke the aircraft apart into multiple large sections, which came to a rest short of the river bank.
Captain Buschmann and 10 of the plane's 139 passen
The aircraft involved in the incident was a McDonnell Douglas MD-82 (registration N215AA), a derivative of the McDonnell Douglas DC-9 and part of the McDonnell Douglas MD-80 series of aircraft. It was delivered new to American Airlines in 1983, and had been operated continuously by the airline since, accumulating a total of 49,136 flight hours. The aircraft was equipped with Pratt & Whitney JT8D-217C turbofan jet engines.
The aircraft was equipped with X band weather radar, which is susceptible to attenuation during heavy precipitation, and did not have an attenuation alert to warn the flight crew of system impairment during heavy rainfall. The radar weather system had a forward-looking design that offered the flight crew only a limited field of view in front of the aircraft.
The aircraft touched down on Runway 4R at 23:50:20. About 2 seconds after the wheels touched down, First Officer Origel stated: "We're down. We're sliding!" Because the pilots failed to arm the autospoiler, the spoilers did not deploy automatically on landing, and the flight crew did not deploy them manually. Spoilers disrupt the airflow over the wings and prevent them from generating lift. That causes the plane's weight to be borne by the landing gear. About 65 percent of Flight 1420's weight would have been supported by the plane's landing gear if the spoilers are deployed, but without the spoilers this number dropped to only 15 percent. With the light loading of the landing gear, the aircraft's brakes were ineffective at slowing down the plane, which continued down the runway at high speed. Directional control was lost when Captain Buschmann applied too much reverse thrust, which reduced the effectiveness of the plane's rudder and vertical stabilizer.
The aircraft continued past the end of the runway, traveling another 800 feet and striking a security fence and an ILS localizer array. The aircraft then collided with a structure built to support the landing lights for runway 22L, which extended out into the Arkansas River. Such structures are usually frangible, that is, designed to shear off on impact, but because the approach lights were located on the unstable river bank, they were firmly anchored. The collision with the nonfrangible structure crushed the airplane's nose and destroyed the left side of the plane's fuselage, from the cockpit back to the first two rows of coach seating. The impact broke the aircraft apart into multiple large sections, which came to a rest short of the river bank.
Captain Buschmann and 10 of the plane's 139 passen