Delta Airlines Boeing 737-232 incident
Boeing 737-232 · Incident en route
From Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport (SDF) to Blue Grass Airport (LEX)
Event
- NTSB case
- ATL87IA201
- 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
Boeing 737-232
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 737
- 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
- N324DL
- Operator
- Delta Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport (SDF), Louisville, KYTo Blue Grass Airport (LEX), Lexington, KY
- 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
- Miscellaneous/other
- 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
- Pilot in command › Airport, not identified
- Pilot in command › Became lost/disoriented, not corrected
- Pilot in command › In-flight planning/decision, poor
- Pilot in command › Landed at wrong airport, performed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THUNDERSTORMS AND LIGHTNING IN THE VICINITY OF THE ARPT PREVENTED ADDING FUEL TO THE ACFT AND RESULTED IN A DELAYED DEPARTURE. THE LOU VOR WAS OUT OF SERVICE, AND THE FLT WAS RADAR VECTORED UNTIL IT WAS CLEARED DIRECT TO LEX AND FOR THE APCH. AT THE TIME OF THE CLEARANCE THE FLT WAS 25 NM WNW OF THE DEST ARPT AND NORTH OF THE FLT PLAN ROUTE. BOTH APCH CONTROL AND TWR WERE CLOSED FOR THE NIGHT AT LEX. THE VOR AND ILS AT THE DEST ARPT WERE REPORTED TO BE OPERATIONAL. ANOTHER COMPANY AIRCRAFT LANDED AT LEX WHILE THIS FLT WAS EN ROUTE. ATC ATTEMPTED TO CONTACT THIS ACFT WHEN IT WAS OBSERVED ON RADAR TO BE DESCENDING FROM THE ASSIGNED ALT PRIOR TO REACHING THEIR DEST. ATC REQUESTED THE ASSISTANCE OF ANOTHER ACFT'S CREW IN ATTEMPTING TO CONTACT THIS FLT BUT WERE UNSUCCESSFUL. SHORTLY AFTER RECEIVING APCH CLEARANCE, THE CREW SPOTTED AN ARPT WITH RUNWAY LIGHTS ON, ENTERED THE TRAFFIC PATTERN AND LANDED. THEY WERE SEVENTEEN NM FROM THEIR SCHEDULED DEST.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record ATL87IA201
- Event ID
- 20001213X31387
- Case number
- ATL87IA201
- 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: a534ba5391e713cf39012ddd1f4c8f878d6fd8dc17dabc86d60c50c88747722b; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:39:50.217Z.