American Airlines McDonnell Douglas DC-10-10 accident
McDonnell Douglas DC-10-10 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure during initial climb
From Chicago O'Hare International Airport (ORD) to Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI87MA101
- 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 DC-10-10
- Aircraft type
- McDonnell Douglas DC-10
- 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
- N128AA
- Operator
- American Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Chicago O'Hare International Airport (ORD), Chicago, ILTo Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW), DALLAS/FT.WORTH, TX
- 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
- Initial climb
- 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
- Emergency equipment › Improper use of
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Chicago, IL, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
AFTER ARRIVING AT THE GATE IN CHICAGO, FUMES & SMOKE WERE NOTED IN ZONE C OF THE CABIN, THEN THE CABIN LGTG WENT OUT & THE EMERG LGTG CAME ON. MAINT PSNL FND THE #2 APU HAD AN AUTO-SHUTDOWN DUE TO A MALFUNCTION. THE APU WAS PLACARDED AS INOP & THE ACFT WAS RTRND TO SVC. AS IT WAS CLBG, SHORTLY AFTER TAKEOFF, SMOKE BCM NOTICEABLE & THE CREW ELECTED TO RTRNTO THE ARPT & LND. AFTER LNDG, THE SMOKE HAD DISSIPATED & FIRE DEPT PSNL RPRTD NO INDCN OF SMOKE OR FIRE. SUSPECTING ONLY AN AIR CONDITIONING PROBLEM, THE CREW ELECTED TO CONT TO THE GATE. AS THEY BGN TAXIING, A FLT ATTENDANT RPRTD THE SMOKE WAS INCREASING, SO THE CAPT STOPPED THE ACFT & DIRECTED AN EVACUATION. A X-WIND PREVENTED PROPER DEPLOYMENT OF THESLIDES ON THE RGT SIDE OF THE ACFT. DRG THE EVACUATION, AN ELDERLY PAX, USING SLIDE L-4 ON THE LEFT SIDE, WAS SERIOUSLY INJURED BY OTHERS WHO CAME DOWN THE SLIDE AFTER HIM. ALSO, 5 PAX RECEIVED MINOR INJURIES DRG EVACUATION. AN INV REVEALEDTHE SMOKE WAS CAUSED BY OIL FROM A FAILED APU BEARING WHICH LEAKED INTO THE AIR CONDITIONING SYS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI87MA101
- Event ID
- 20001213X30412
- Case number
- CHI87MA101
- 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: 99f978d6ab0814c078e1894d5cc9142c2af57cea7a2bcb3ee388b392ed1800b7; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:41:51.251Z.