United Air Carriers Boeing 747-123 incident
Boeing 747-123 · Incident: airframe, component or system failure before flight
From Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport (DTW) to Harry Reid International Airport (LAS)
Event
- NTSB case
- DCA85IA019
- 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 747-123
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 747
- 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
- N9663
- Operator
- United Air Carriers
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport (DTW), Detroit, MITo Harry Reid International Airport (LAS), Las Vegas, NV
- 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
- Prior to flight
- 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
- Passenger compartment light(s) › Overtemperature
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THE FLT CREWMEMBERS OF THE JUMBO JET WERE PREPARING TO START THE ENGS WHEN FLT ATTENDANTS (F/A'S) IN THE FORWARD CABIN DETECTED A FAINT ODOR PRIOR TO CLOSING DOOR 1L. THE SOURCE COULD NOT BE DETERMINED, SO THE DOOR WAS CLOSED IN PREPARATION FOR A PUSHBACK. SHORTLY THEREAFTER, SMOKE WAS DISCOVERED IN THE VICINITY OF THE OVERHEAD BIN AT ROW 16. THE CAPTAIN WAS NOTIFIED & HE ORDERED THAT 'OCCUPANTS EVACUATE, IF THERE IS A FIRE ONBOARD.' THE JETWAY WAS BROUGHT BACK TO DOOR 1L. THE SMOKE DISSIPATED; THUS, THE F/A'S AT DOORS 1R, 2L & 2R DID NOT OPEN THEIR DOORS. HOWEVER, THE F/A'S AT THE OTHER 6 DOORS WERE UNAWARE OF THE SITUATION & CONTINUED THE EVACUATION. THE RAMPS AT DOORS 3L & 3R DID NOT INFLATE & DOOR 5R JAMMED HALFWAY OPEN. THE RAMP PACKS FOR 3R & 3L WERE IMPROPERLY MOUNTED. THE 5R PACK BOARD WAS MADE FOR A LEFT HAND DOOR & THE LANYARD WAS NOT CONNECTED TO THE BOTTOM PANEL PULLEY. AN EXAM REVEALED A BALLAST FOR AN OVERHEAD FLOURESCENT LIGHT, PN 69-33C, HAD OVERHEATED & MELTED THE PLASTIC CASE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DCA85IA019
- Event ID
- 20001214X36146
- Case number
- DCA85IA019
- 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: 4a522db3ccf619da91e986cdfd0a275d460e67578976c42671ea939d4e504e0c; retrieved 2026-09-18T20:26:41.370Z.