ATL96FA043 · Douglas DC-9-32
Douglas DC-9-32 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure during landing
From Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) to Nashville International Airport (BNA)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL96FA043
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- Airline
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Douglas DC-9-32
- Aircraft type
- Douglas DC-9
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N903VJ
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL), Atlanta, GATo Nashville International Airport (BNA), TN
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 121: Air Carrier
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Landing · landing roll
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Airframe, component or system failure
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Company maintenance personnel › Maintenance, inspection, inadequate
- Landing gear, main gear shock absorbing strut › Failure, total
- Manufacturer › Procedure inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
During landing, the right main landing gear shock strut cylinder and piston failed which caused the axle, wheels, and tires to separate. Metallurgical examination showed that the fracture surfaces had been damaged after separation. Two areas on the cylinder fracture face were not at an angle to suggest overstress separation, and ratchet marks were present which usually separate initiation sights on offset fracture planes. The piston fracture surfaces had features typical of overstress separation. The right main landing torque links had failed during landing 312 flight hours before this accident. The torque links, shimmy damper, and piston were replaced at that time; the cylinder was not replaced.
Probable cause
the failure of the right main landing gear shock strut cylinder due to preexisting fractures. Contributing to the accident was: the failure of the operator to inspect the shock strut cylinder for fractures following a previous failure of the torque links, and the absence of specific directives and procedures from the aircraft manufacturer to inspect or replace the shock strut cylinder following torque link failure.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL96FA043
- Event ID
- 20001208X05207
- Case number
- ATL96FA043
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: dd921754795aef363d9d3c5d7a7b34b7fc6862dccb3da80d1147994b8a7f54b1; retrieved 2026-09-18T17:54:12.925Z.