Pan American World Airways Airbus Industrie A310 accident
Airbus Industrie A310 · Accident: in flight encounter with weather en route
From John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) to Maiquetía Simón Bolívar International Airport (CCS)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA88FA032
- 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
Airbus Industrie A310
- Aircraft type
- Airbus A310
- 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
- N813PA
- Operator
- Pan American World Airways
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK), NEW YORK, NYTo Maiquetía Simón Bolívar International Airport (CCS), CRCS,VENEZUELA
- 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
- 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
- Weather condition › Turbulence, clear air
Not plotted · Location withheld: coordinates are missing, conflicting, invalid, or have no accepted acquisition method. No substitute location has been invented.
NTSB narrative
THE CAPT SAID HE EXPECTED SOME WX DRG THE 1ST 2 HRS OF FLT. AFTER LVLG AT FL 330, THE ACFT WAS IN CLEAR WX, BUT LGT TURBC CONTD FOR A TIME. AFTER THE TURBC HAD STOPPED & THERE WERE NO WX RTRNS ON THE RADAR, THE SEAT BELT SIGN WAS TURNED OFF, ALTHOUGH THE CAPT SUGGESTED TO THE PAX THAT THEY KEEP THEIR SEAT BELTS FASTENED. ABOUT 15 MINUTES LATER (APRX 2 HR & 6 MIN AFTER TKOF), THE ACFT ENCTRD SVR CLEAR AIR TURBC (CAT) W/O WARNING. SUBSEQUENTLY, IT PITCHED, THE AUTO-PLT DISCONNECTED & 35 OCCUPANTS WERE INJURED. THREE PAX WERE SERIOUSLY INJURED; 25 PAX & 7 FLT ATTENDANTS RCVD MINOR INJURIES. THE FLT THEN DIVERTED TO MIAMI WHERE THE INJURED WERE TREATED. A WX STUDY SHOWED THE TURBC WAS ENCTRD NEAR THE EDGE OF THE JET STREAM WHERE THE ACFT HAD CROSSED ABOUT 6000' OVER A CELL (OR GROUP OF CELLS). WINDS AT THAT POINT WERE ESTD TO BE FROM 260 DEG AT ABOUT 55 KTS. MODERATE TO SVR TURBC WAS FORECAST NEAR RAIN SHOWERS &/OR TSTMS.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record MIA88FA032
- Event ID
- 20001213X32573
- Case number
- MIA88FA032
- 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. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1987-11-12.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 60d319f2cfa2f2ecfb46b3a6c0363a0e5a8e750352e4b5f7686b5a821e338f49; retrieved 2026-09-18T19:35:32.121Z.