Delta Airlines McDonnell Douglas MD-88 accident
McDonnell Douglas MD-88 · Accident: fire while standing
From Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) to CVG · Cincinnati, OH
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW99LA054
- 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
McDonnell Douglas MD-88
- Aircraft type
- McDonnell Douglas MD-88
- 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
- N907DE
- Operator
- Delta Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW)To CVG · Cincinnati, OH
- 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 · engine(s) operating
- 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
- Fire
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- None
Cause areas
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Not plotted · Location withheld: coordinates are missing, conflicting, invalid, or have no accepted acquisition method. No substitute location has been invented.
NTSB narrative
The flight crew neglected to turn the ignition switch on during a delayed right engine start prior to taking the active runway for departure. During the second attempt to start the engine, an overtemp occurred and a tailpipe fire ensued. Tower personnel observed flames coming out of the exhaust stack and alerted the flight crew. The flight crew reported that they had experienced a 'hot start,' but according to their indications in the cockpit, the fire was out. The flight crew of an airplane in sequence behind the jet reported that the fire lingered in the exhaust. Personnel in the control tower confirmed that the engine was still on fire. The captain commanded an evacuation from the two doors on the left side of the airplane. All passengers were off the aircraft within 20 seconds of slide deployment. A passenger slid down the aft door slide past the awaiting crew members, twisting her right ankle. Subsequent medical reports and X-rays revealed she sustained a hairline fracture of a bone in her right ankle. The ignition and fuel systems for the right engine were inspected, no defects were found, and the airplane was returned to service.
Probable cause
A passenger sustained a hairline fracture during an emergency evacuation of the airplane.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW99LA054
- Event ID
- 20001211X11566
- Case number
- FTW99LA054
- 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, damage. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1998-12-27.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 355150764a00156cff73c5b2c71a08febd794f8b6480da9dcc25c2a2d14b2438; retrieved 2026-09-18T17:01:07.767Z.
- The NTSB's operator name is blank for N907DE; the operator shown is the name the NTSB records it doing business as.