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Piedmont Airport Boeing 737-222 incident

28 Dec 1982 · Washington, DC, United States

Boeing 737-222 · Incident on approach

From Roanoke–Blacksburg Regional Airport (ROA) to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA)

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Event

NTSB case
ATL83IA085
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 737-222

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
N752N
Onboard fatalities
Unknown
Route
From Roanoke–Blacksburg Regional Airport (ROA), Roanoke, VATo Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA), Washington, DC
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
Approach · circling (IFR)
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
Miscellaneous/other
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

  • Pilot in command › IFR procedure, improper
  • Pilot in command › Proper alignment, not maintained
  • Pilot in command › Proper altitude, not maintained

Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Washington, DC, the place the record names. Not the accident site.

NTSB narrative

THE ACFT WAS OBSERVED BY WITNESSES TO DESCEND BELOW ITS NORMAL DESCENT PATH AND TO HORIZONTIALLY STRAY OFF COURSE TO THEPOINT THAT OFFICE BLDG OCCUPANTS AND PERSONS ON THE GROUND WERE CONCERNED BY THE APPEARANCE AND NOISE OF THE ACFT DURINGA VOR/DME APPROACH TO WASHINGTON NAT'L ARPT. THE FDR AND RADAR PLOTS CONFIRM THE POSITION OF THE ACFT. ONE OF THE BUILDINGS 2.5 MILES FROM THE ARPT IS ABOUT 396 FT MSL. THE VOR/DME APPROACH HAS AN ALT RESTRICTION OF 900 FT MSL AT 3 NMAND A MINIMUM DESCENT ALT OF 720 FT AT 2.5 NM. THE PLT WAS INTERVIEWED AND HE STATED THAT HE THOUGHT EVERYTHING WAS NORMAL AND THAT HE WAS AT THE ALT RESTRICTION AT THE 3 MILE DME. RADAR SHOWS HIS ALT AS ABOUT 517 FT AT 3 MILE DME AND ABOUT 400 FT AT 2.5 MILE DME. RADAR AND WITNESSES AGREE ON A TURN AND CLIMB AT THIS POINT TOWARD THE RIVER AND THE NORMAL APPROACH PATH.

Verbatim NTSB analysis from the NTSB dataset

Sources

NTSB record ATL83IA085
Event ID
20020917X04343
Case number
ATL83IA085
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: 9a39607d768d7d3d673380e5768d3cdc67aa94883df2666dd9bc305aab0cad87; retrieved 2026-09-18T21:03:37.433Z.