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American Airlines British Aerospace BAE 146-200A BAE 146-20 incident

13 Feb 1989 · Los Alamitos, CA, United States

British Aerospace BAE 146-200A BAE 146-20 · Incident: near collision between aircraft en route

From Mineta San Jose International Airport (SJC) to Ontario International Airport (ONT)

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Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's departure or destination. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.

Event

NTSB case
LAX89IA112
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
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

British Aerospace BAE 146-200A BAE 146-20

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
N141AC
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route Possible conflict
From Mineta San Jose International Airport (SJC), San Jose, CATo Ontario International Airport (ONT), Ontario, CA
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
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
Near collision between aircraft
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

  • Atc personnel(artcc) › Crew/group coordination, inadequate
  • Atc personnel(dep/apch) › Crew/group coordination, inadequate
  • Radar separation › Not maintained

Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.

NTSB narrative

DUE TO FAILURE OF RWY LIGHTS AT THE DESTN (JOHN WAYNE ARPT) AMERICAN AIRLINE FLT 1262 (BAE-146) DIVERTED TO ONTARIO, CA. WHILE EN ROUTE, IT CONVERGED WITH BRITISH AIRWAYS FLT 282 (BOEING 747), WHICH WAS CLIMBING FROM THE LOS ANGELES INTL ARPT ON A FLT TO LONDON, ENGLAND. SUBSEQUENTLY, AN OPNL ERROR OCCURRED WHEN THE ACFT PASSED WITH A HORIZONTAL SEPN OF ABOUT 1.9 MI AT THE SAME ALT. AN INVESTIGATION REVEALED THAT AFTER COAST TRACON RCVD CONTROL OF FLT 1262 FROM LOS ANGELES CENTER. FLT 1262 WAS CLEARED INTO THE AIRSPACE OF LOS ANGELES TRACON WITHOUT PROPER COORDINATION AMONG THE 3 ATC CONTROL FACILITIES. SPECIFICALLY, THERE WAS INCOMPLETE AND MISUNDERSTOOD COORDINATION BETWEEN CTLRS AT LOS ANGELES CENTER AND COAST TRACON; THE HARBOR SECTOR RADAR AND HANDOFF CTLRS AT COAST TRACON FAILED TO COMPLY WITH PROVISIONS OF LTR OF AGREEMENT BETWEEN COAST TRACON AND AJACENT FACILITIES.

Probable cause

INADEQUATE COORDINATION AMONG THE ATC CONTROLLERS WHICH RESULTED IN THEIR FAILURE TO MAINTAIN ADEQUATE RADAR SEPARATION OF THE TWO AIRCRAFT.

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record LAX89IA112
Event ID
20001213X27743
Case number
LAX89IA112
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: 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 1989-02-14.
  • API snapshot SHA-256: 66b0fa5676f960bec5f51863d1b45aff43ea6a1ebb173e72028595ca1a198c0a; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:14:08.621Z.