Metro Flight Saab-Fairchild 340A incident
Saab-Fairchild 340A · Incident: in flight encounter with weather on approach
From Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) to Jack Brooks Regional Airport (BPT)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW90IA030
- 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
Saab-Fairchild 340A
- Aircraft type
- Saab Fairchild 340
- 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
- N363MA
- Operator
- Metro Flight
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW), DFW AIRPORT, TXTo Jack Brooks Regional Airport (BPT)
- 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
- Approach · VFR pattern base
- 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
- In flight encounter with weather
- Also codedOther events the NTSB coded in the sequence, such as a wire strike after a loss of power. Flight Findings uses them for its kinds of event. Glossary
- Tree(s)
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Minor
Cause areas
- Copilot/second pilot › Monitoring, not performed
- Pilot in command › Airspeed(vref), not maintained
- Pilot in command › Go-around, delayed
- Pilot in command › Proper descent rate, exceeded
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Beaumont, TX, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
DUE TO SHOWERS ON THE ILS RUNWAY, THE CREW ELECTED TO CIRCLE AND LAND RWY 30. MDA WAS 540 FT, ADJUSTED VREF WAS 130 KTS. AT THE 90 DEGREE POSITION TO THE RWY, IAS WAS 131 KTS. ALTITUDE WAS 528 FT. DURING THE DESCENDING BASE TO FINAL TURN, THE POWER WENT TO FLIGHT IDLE. THE AIRSPEED WENT BELOW ADJUSTED VREF, AND THE RADAR ALTITUDE WENT DOWN TO 176 FEET. THE RADAR ALTITUDE WAS 56 FEET, AND THE AIRPSEED WAS 112 KNOTS WHEN THE TORQUE STARTED TO INCREASE. LOWEST RADAR ALTITUDE WAS 16 FEET, AND LOWEST AIRSPEED WAS 100 KNOTS. AIRPLANE IMPACTED TOPS OF TREES, APRX 2,200 FEET FROM APCH END OF RUNWAY. PIC SAID THAT DURING TURN FROM BASE TO FINAL, F/O LOST SIGHT OF RUNWAY IN A RAINSHOWER AND A GO-AROUND WAS INITIATED. PIC OF AIRPLANE, WAITING AT HOLD LINE FOR WX TO IMPROVE BEFORE TAKEOFF, SAW THE AIRPLANE DISAPPEAR BEHIND TREES, DURING HEAVY RAIN. HIS F/O CALLED IT A WALL OF WATER.
Probable cause
THE PILOT FAILED TO MAINTAIN ADJUSTED VREF AND PROPER DESCENT RATES DURING THE APPROACH. THE PILOT DELAYED DECISION TO EXECUTE A GO-AROUND AND THE COPILOT FAILED TO MONITOR THE POORLY FLOWN APPROACH. CONTRIBUTING TO THE ACCIDENT WAS THE RAIN AND WIND SHEAR ENCOUNTERED DURING THE APPROACH AND THE CREW'S POOR EVALUATION OF THAT WEATHER.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW90IA030
- Event ID
- 20001213X29794
- Case number
- FTW90IA030
- 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: 57193f33378fae7c6729afb65e968ebc57154be3a5faebade87990a7d8c3cde8; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:06:49.539Z.