Southwest Airlines Boeing 737-2H4 incident
Boeing 737-2H4 · Incident: airframe, component or system failure during takeoff
From Dallas Love Field (DAL) to Austin Bergstrom International Airport (AUS)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW86MA030
- 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 737-2H4
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 737
- 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
- N86SW
- Operator
- Southwest Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Dallas Love Field (DAL)To Austin Bergstrom International Airport (AUS), Austin, TX
- 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
- Takeoff · roll/run
- 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
- Minor
Cause areas
- Company maintenance personnel › Maintenance, installation, improper
- Engine installation, suspension mounts › Failure, partial
- Engine installation, suspension mounts › Fatigue
- Engine installation, suspension mounts › Overload
- Engine installation, suspension mounts › Separation
- Engine installation, suspension mounts › Undertorqued
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
THIS INCIDENT OCCURRED WHEN THE NO. 2 ENGINE EXPERIENCED AN AFT ENGINE MOUNT CONE BOLT FAILURE AND THE SUBSEQUENT FAILURE OF THE SECONDARY SUPPORT LINK (STAINLESS STEEL CABLE). THE FAILURE OF BOTH AFT ENGINE SUPPORT ASSEMBLIES DURING THE TAKEOFF ROLL ALLOWED THE AFT SECTION OF THE ENG TO HANG DOWN TO WITHIN 4' OF THE GROUND. AS A RESULT, THE NO.2 THRUST REVERSER ACTUATOR ASSEMBLY DRUG THE RUNWAY ON ROTATION. IN ADDITION, ONE LEADING EDGE FLAP AND THE FORWARD ENGINE FAIRING WERE SLIGHTLY DAMAGED. THE ACFT SUBSEQUENTLY RETURNED TO THE ARPT AND LANDED WITHOUT FURTHER INCIDENT. METALLURGICAL EXAMINATION OF THE CONE BOLT REVEALED THAT IT FAILED AS A RESULT OF FATIGUE, MOST PROBABLY DUE TO IMPROPER INSTALLATION OF THE BOLT, SPECIFICALLY, THAT IT WAS UNDER TORQUED WHEN THE OPERATOR RE-INSTALLED THE ENG. THE SAFETY CABLE FAILED AS A RESULT OF OVERSTRESS, PROBABLY INDUCED WHEN THE ACFT ENCOUNTERED A ROUGH STRETCH OF RUNWAY DURING THE TAKEOFF ROLL.
Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record FTW86MA030
- Event ID
- 20010110X00187
- Case number
- FTW86MA030
- 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. 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: d8303edd258ce2c8d1319fc064f25176f458e7bc51eee612737fe7e1edca2e83; retrieved 2026-09-18T20:10:37.413Z.
- The NTSB's operator name is blank for N86SW; the operator shown is the name the NTSB's other records give its FAA operator code, SWAA.