Accident · 1998-11-01

What the record says

Event date

1998-11-01

Event type

Accident

Highest injury level

Minor injury

Aircraft

Boeing 737-200 (NEICJW)

Operating rule

Part 121

Operator

AIRTRAN AIRWAYS INC Operator named in NTSB report

Operated by (per NTSB report)

AIRTRAN AIRWAYS INC

Probable cause

(1) the capping of the incorrect hydraulic line by mechanics, which led to the failure of hydraulic system A; (2) the mechanics' lack of experience working with the Boeing 737 hydraulic system; and (3) the maintenance controller's failure to ascertain more information regarding the leaking hydraulic line before instructing the mechanics to cap the line and deactivate the right thrust reverser. Contributing to the cause of the accident were (1) the asymmetric directional control resulting from the deactivation of the right thrust reverser; (2) the depletion of the left and right inboard brake accumulator pressure because of the flight crew's use of the rudder pedals with only the left thrust reverser to control the direction of the airplane down the runway; (3) the failure of the right outboard brake because the airplane was slowed without the use of the left and right inboard brakes and was traveling at a higher-than-normal speed and with heavy gross weight; (4) the failure of the right outboard brake after one of the right outboard pistons overtraveled and unported its o-ring, allowing system B hydraulic fluid to deplete and the left outboard brake to fail; and (5) the mechanics' improper use of the illustrated parts catalog for maintenance and troubleshooting and the maintenance controller's failure to use the appropriate documents for maintenance and troubleshooting.

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.