AMR Eagle Fairchild SA 227 incident
Fairchild SA 227 · Incident: airframe, component or system failure en route
From Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU) to Richmond International Airport (RIC)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL90IA177
- 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
- Incident
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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
Fairchild SA 227
- Aircraft type
- Fairchild SA-227
- 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
- N619AV
- Operator
- AMR Eagle
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU), Raleigh, NCTo Richmond International Airport (RIC), Richmond, VA
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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 · 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
- 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
- None
Cause areas
- Flight control, rudder tab › Failure, total
- Flight control, rudder tab › Fatigue
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
DURING CRUISE FLIGHT AT 3000 FEET ALTITUDE, THE PILOT EXPERIENCED A COMPLETE LOSS OF RUDDER CONTROL FOR ABOUT 20 SECONDS. AFTERWARD HE COULD FEEL CONTINUOUS MOTION IN THE RUDDER THROUGH THE PEDALS, THEREFORE THE PILOT REDUCED HIS AIRSPEED FROM 180 KNOTS TO AN AIRSPEED WHICH ALLOWED FOR LESS RUDDER VIBRATION. AN EMERGENCY WAS DECLARED AND THE FLIGHT LANDED SAFELY. SUBSEQUENT EXAMINATIONS DISCLOSED THAT THE RUDDER TRIM TAB CONTROL ROD END FAILED IN FATIGUE. ACCORDING TO FAA RECORDS, OTHER CONTROL FAILURES WERE REPORTED WHICH PROMPTED THE ISSUANCE OF AN EMERGENCY AIRWORTHINESS DIRECTIVE TO PREVENT THE POSSIBLE LOSS OF CONTROL OF THE AIRPLANE.
Probable cause
THE FATIGUE FAILURE OF THE RUDDER TRIM CONTROL ROD END.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL90IA177
- Event ID
- 20001212X24179
- Case number
- ATL90IA177
- 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, damage. 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: d1cce4bca780ec5578a7f9a0b7a361c3e2d08fb4bf0dacf1e01bec07ccecfb26; retrieved 2026-09-18T18:59:19.711Z.