Eastern Airlines Boeing 727-225 incident
Boeing 727-225 and Usaf, 19TH Aref Wingf Boeing KC-135A · Incident: near collision between aircraft en route
Event
- NTSB case
- DCA84IA030
- 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
Aircraft 1 · 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
- N8840E
- Operator
- Eastern Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Miami International Airport (MIA), Miami, FLTo Chicago O'Hare International Airport (ORD), Chicago, IL
- 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
- Near collision between aircraft
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- None
Aircraft 2 · Boeing KC-135A
- Aircraft type
- Boeing KC-135
- 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
- USAF
- Operator
- Usaf, 19TH Aref Wingf
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Robins Air Force Base (WRB), WARNER ROBBINS, GATo Robins Air Force Base (WRB), Warner Robins, GA
- 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 91: General Aviation
- 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 collision with terrain/water
- 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
- Atc personnel(artcc) › IFR separation standards, not maintained
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
EASTERN AIRLINES FLT 92, A BOEING 727, N8840E, AND AN AIR FORCE KC-135, REG #60-0330, CALL SIGN FOWL 24, WERE INVOLVED IN A NEAR COLLISION WHILE BOTH ACFT WERE MAINTAINING FL350. THE CAPTAIN OF FLT 92 REPORTED THAT DURING THE OCCURRENCE, THE KC-135 PASSED DIRECTLY IN FRONT OF HIS ACFT AT A DISTANCE OF ABOUT 1/4 MI, CROSSING FROM RIGHT TO LEFT. ALSO, HE REPORTED THAT THERE WAS INSUFFICIENT TIME FOR HIM TO AVOID WAKE TURBULENCE FROM THE KC-135. THE KC-135 FLT CREW WERE UNAWARE OF THE OCCURRENCE UNTIL AFTER THEY HAD COMPLETED THEIR TRAINING FLT. AN INVESTIGATION REVEALED THAT THE INCIDENT OCCURRED AFTER JACKSONVILLE CENTER HAD INSTRUCTED THE KC-135 CREW TO CONTACT ATLANTA CENTER DURING A HAND-OFF. THE KC-135 COPLT THOUGHT HE HAD COMPLIED, BUT NO CALLS WERE RECORDED UNTIL AFTER THE INCIDENT. THE ATLANTA CONTROLLER WAS NOT AWARE OF THE KC-135 IN HIS ASSIGNED AIRSPACE UNTIL AFTER THE CAPTAIN OF FLT 92 REPORTED THE NEAR COLLISION. THE INVESTIGATION REVEALED THAT RADAR DATA ON THE KC-135 WAS AVAILABLE & DISPLAYED ON THE CONTROLLER'S SCOPE.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DCA84IA030
- Event ID
- 20001214X40261
- Case number
- DCA84IA030
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (5)
- 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: 261306f3fc8eb18fba1bd7feb9f0ec3131b431a4eae34572baa685ca08ef7030; retrieved 2026-09-18T20:38:51.254Z.
- Corrected after a review of the NTSB narrative, which states these values explicitly: operator. The NTSB narrative names the operator: "EASTERN AIRLINES FLT 92, A BOEING 727, N8840E, AND AN AIR FORCE KC-135"