Accident · 1996-05-16

What the record says

Event date

1996-05-16

Event type

Accident

Highest injury level

Minor injury

Aircraft

McDonnell Douglas MD-11-F (N614FE)

Operating rule

Part 121

Operator

FEDERAL EXPRESS CORPORATION Operator named in NTSB report

Operated by (per NTSB report)

FEDERAL EXPRESS

Probable cause

the pilot's improper in-flight planning/decision, which allowed the airplane (MD-11) to encounter wake turbulence from a larger/heavy jet airplane (Boeing 747), while on a short final approach for landing on a close-by/parallel runway with a staggered threshold. Factors relating to the accident were the staggered/off-set runway thresholds, which positioned the normal approach path of runway 24R below that of runway 24L; the steeper than normal final approach path; and the left crosswind, which resulted in wake turbulence drifting from the Boeing 747's approach path to the MD-11's approach path.

Flight crew

Flight-crew details for this event aren't in the NTSB database extract we hold (its coverage starts with 2008 events) — a gap in our data, not an absence of crew.