Horizon Airlines Fairchild SA-227AC accident
Fairchild SA-227AC · Accident: loss of control on ground/water during landing
From Salt Lake City International Airport (SLC) to Friedman Memorial Airport (SUN)
Event
- NTSB case
- SEA85LA070
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- 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
Fairchild SA-227AC
- Aircraft type
- Fairchild SA-227
- 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
- N3115U
- Operator
- Horizon Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Salt Lake City International Airport (SLC), Salt Lake City, UTTo Friedman Memorial Airport (SUN), Hailey, ID
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- Landing · landing roll
- 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
- Loss of control on ground/water
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Pilot in command › Directional control, inadequate
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
ON LDG THE EXPERIENCED CAPTN ENCOUNTERED A RIGHT DRIFT ON THE DRY RWY WITH NEGLIGIBLE WINDS. RUDDER/PWR/NOSEWHEEL STEERING INPUTS WERE INSUFFICIENT TO REGAIN DIRECTIONAL CONTROL. RIGHT DRIFT TRANSLATED INTO A STRONG RIGHT SWERVE WITH CONTINUED APPLICATION OF FULL LEFT NOSEWHEEL STEERING AND SIMULTANEOUS BRAKING. ACFT DEPARTED RIGHT SIDE OF RWY AND NOSEWHEEL OBSERVED TRACKING STRAIGHT INTO SNOW & NO NOSEWHEEL SKID MARKS OBSERVED. TESTING REVEALED REDUCED NOSEWHEEL STEERING EFFECTIVENESS WITH DECREASING NOSE STRUT COMPRESSION DUE TO ENGAGEMENT OF CENTERING CAM. CAPTN REPORTED 'NOSE HIGH' TAXI ATTITUDE AND 'PITCH SENSITIVE' FLT. CAPTN/OTHER PLTS REPORTED DIFFICULTY ACHIEVING EQUAL BRAKING DURING CONDITIONS OF LARGE RUDDER PEDAL DISPLACEMENT. THIS CONDITION IS NOT ADDRESSED IN PLT/OPS MANUALS. CHECK OF BRAKE/NOSEWHEEL STEERING SYSTEMS REVEALED NO MECHANICAL MALFUNCTION.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record SEA85LA070
- Event ID
- 20001214X36048
- Case number
- SEA85LA070
- 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 1985-03-09.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 7b0972d802ea244ea9883c06ae7d6bbf922481d755f7439b2033ebfa9e32bef9; retrieved 2026-09-18T20:30:17.222Z.