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Eastern Air Lines Boeing 727-225 incident

11 Jul 1987 · Washington, DC, United States

Boeing 727-225 · Incident: in flight encounter with weather on approach

From Orlando International Airport (MCO) to an unrecorded destination

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Event

NTSB case
MIA87IA204
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
Instrument Meteorological Cond

Boeing 727-225

Aircraft type
Boeing 727
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
N8892Z
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Orlando International Airport (MCO), Orlando, FLTo not recorded
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 · IFR missed approach
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
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

  • Pilot in command › Flight into known adverse weather, continued
  • Pilot in command › Weather evaluation, improper
  • Turbine assembly, turbine blade › Overtemperature

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

NTSB narrative

DRG ARR, THE ACFT'S RADAR SHOWED TSTMS IN THE AREA OF THE ARPT. AS THE FLT CONTD, ATIS INFO CHGD. WHEN THE PLTS CTCD WASHINGTON APCH CTL WITH OLD ATIS INFO, THE CTLR DID NOT CORRECT THE FLT. THEY WERE ADZD OF HVY RAIN, STRONG WNDS & A PIREP OF WNDSHR NR THE ARPT, BUT THEY WERE NOT INFORMED THAT THE LOW LVL WNDSHR ALERT SYS (LLWAS) WAS INOP. THE FLT WAS VECTORED FOR A ROSSLYN RWY 18 APCH. AFTER CTCG THE TWR, THE PLTS WERE ADZD THE WND WAS FM 230 DEG AT 35 TO 45 KTS. SHORTLY THEREAFTER, ON FINAL APCH, THE ACFT WAS 'INUNDATED' BY RAIN. THE CREW LOST SIGHT OF THE ARPT, BGN A MISSED APCH (M/A), & ENCTRD LARGE HAIL & MOD TURBC. DRG THE M/A, THE ACFT STOPPED CLBG AT APRX 600' & THE SPEED SLOWED FM 170 TO 138 KTS. THE CAPT APPLIED FULL PWR & THE ACFT RESPONDED, BUT THE N1 & EGT LMTS WERE EXCEEDED. THE CAPT REDUCED PWR & DIVERTED TO DULLES INTL ARPT. A POST FLT EXAM REVEALED THE 1ST & 2ND STAGE TURBINE BLADES OF ALL 3 ENGS HAD BEEN OVERTEMPED.

Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record MIA87IA204
Event ID
20001213X31580
Case number
MIA87IA204
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: b528a36ecbec1a15ac84f461837e7b225ea3ecd9e32e8a6bfabc161376287ed3; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:39:37.339Z.