Flight 1986 · Boeing 767-300ER
Boeing 767-300ER · Accident: propeller blast or jet exhaust/suction while taxiing
From Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) to Boston Logan International Airport (BOS)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's injuries. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC01LA076
- 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
- Unknown
- 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 767-300ER
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 767
- 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
- N155DL
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), Los Angeles Int, CATo Boston Logan International Airport (BOS), Boston, MA
- 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
- Taxi
- 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
- Propeller blast or jet exhaust/suction
- 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
- Driver of vehicle › Planning/decision, improper
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The flightcrew was taxiing to the gate, but stopped short to wait for a required third wingwalker. As the airplane was stopped, several ground vehicles passed behind it along a vehicle service road. At the time the third wingwalker arrived, a ramp serviceman was operating a tug along the vehicle service road. As the tug passed behind the airplane, the airplane began to taxi to the gate. The jet blast blew an empty container, which was being towed by the tug. As the ramp serviceman attempted to retrieve the container, he was also blown to the ground. The serviceman sustained head injuries and was transported to the local hospital. The local port authority regulations prohibited operation of ground vehicles behind an airplane with operating engines. However, the serviceman was not cited for any violations by the port authority.
Probable cause
The vehicle driver's improper decision to pass behind an aircraft with operating engines, which resulted in an encounter with jet blast.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC01LA076
- Event ID
- 20010216X00462
- Case number
- NYC01LA076
- 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: ff9e55675a89c111563eda3c1104b91969c1654eed2a8de734726a1a2a35bfb0; retrieved 2026-09-18T16:18:40.734Z.