Delta Connection Canadair CL600-2B19 accident
Canadair CL600-2B19 · Accident: on ground/water collision with object while standing
From Cincinnati Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG) to McGhee Tyson Airport (TYS)
Event
- NTSB case
- IAD98LA036
- 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
Canadair CL600-2B19
- Aircraft type
- Canadair CL600
- 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
- N937CA
- Operator
- Delta Connection
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Cincinnati Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG)To McGhee Tyson Airport (TYS), Knoxville, 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
- Standing
- 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
- On ground/water collision with object
- 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
- Driver of vehicle › Operation with known deficiencies in equipment, continued
- Driver of vehicle › Procedures/directives, not followed
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Covington, KY, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
The airplane was standing second in line to be de-iced with position and anti-collision lights illuminated, when it was struck from behind by a baggage tug. The tug impacted the trailing edge of the left wing in the vicinity of the left wing tip. The tug driver said he completed two trips past the de-ice pad prior to the collision. Each time the tug was sprayed with de-ice solution (glycol), obscuring the windshield. When the driver attempted to clear his view with the windshield wiper after the first trip, the wiper broke off. He said, 'I couldn't see anything because of the glycol...I was on the ramp road. I couldn't see out the tug [and] never seen the aircraft. I ran into the wing.' Examination of the tug by airport police and company mechanics revealed the wiper was no longer installed. The lights and brakes were operational. According to a company training manual, 'Never operate ground service equipment that is not functioning properly or in need of repair. Immediately report any vehicle in this condition to a supervisor so that corrective action can be taken.'
Probable cause
The driver's operation of a ground vehicle at night with an inoperative windshield wiper and an obscured windscreen against company regulations which resulted in a collision with a parked aircraft.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record IAD98LA036
- Event ID
- 20001211X09692
- Case number
- IAD98LA036
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (5)
- 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: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1998-03-10.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 483b0c6d905de9fabb9f4ff6b8566e943d6e3657837d44135c1b351657e952cc; retrieved 2026-09-18T17:11:59.857Z.
- The NTSB's operator name is blank for N937CA; the operator shown is the name the NTSB records it doing business as.