MIA90FA101 · Lockheed L-1049F
Lockheed L-1049F · Accident: fire en route
From Luis Munoz Marin International Airport (SJU) to Santo Domingo
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA90FA101
- 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
- 1 · 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
- General aviation
- 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
Lockheed L-1049F
- Aircraft type
- Lockheed L-1049
- 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
- HI515
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Luis Munoz Marin International Airport (SJU), San Juan, PRTo Santo Domingo
- 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 91: General Aviation
- 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
- En route · climb to cruise
- 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
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Engine compartment › Fire
- Reason for occurrence undetermined
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Levittown, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE CAPTAIN OF THE AIRPLANE ELECTED TO TAKE OFF ON A THREE ENGINE FERRY FLIGHT WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION. DURING THE THREE ENGINE CLIMB OUT WITH THE NO.3 PROPELLER FEATHERED, THE NO.2 ENGINE CAUGHT FIRE AND HE COULD NOT EXTINGUISH THE FIRE. HE ATTEMPTED TO RETURN AND DURING THE DESCENT THE NO.1 ENGINE FAILED. HE THEN INTENTIONALLY DITCHED THE AIRPLANE IN THE OCEAN, AND RECEIVED FATAL INJURIES. THE AIRPLANE WAS NOT RECOVERED FROM THE OCEAN AND NO DETERMINATION OF CAUSE COULD BE ASCERTAINED.
Probable cause
FIRE OF AN UNDETERMINED ORIGIN THAT RESULTED IN A LOSS OF POWER IN TWO ENGINES DURING A THREE ENGINE FERRY FLIGHT. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO OBTAIN THE REQUIRED AUTHORIZATION FOR THE THREE ENGINE FERRY FLIGHT, AND HIS OPERATION OF THE AIRCRAFT WITH KNOWN DEFICIENCIES.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA90FA101
- Event ID
- 20001212X22964
- Case number
- MIA90FA101
- 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: 537a0fd9d680e06030819f636c057e59f8fbb96f67b8a35620f60e806da1d3ed; retrieved 2026-09-21T02:49:35.474Z.