Northwest Airlines Boeing 757-251 accident
Boeing 757-251 · Accident: on ground/water collision with object while standing
From LaGuardia Airport (LGA) to Minneapolis–Saint Paul International Airport / Wold–Chamberlain Field (MSP)
Narrative check · The NTSB narrative appears to contradict this record's aircraft involved. Values are shown as recorded, not corrected; compare with the narrative.
Event
- NTSB case
- NYC03FA039
- 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 757-251 Narrative disagrees
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 757
- 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
- N550NW
- Operator
- Northwest Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From LaGuardia Airport (LGA), Flushing, NYTo Minneapolis–Saint Paul International Airport / Wold–Chamberlain Field (MSP), Minneapolis, MN
- 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
- Standing · engine(s) not operating
- 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
- On ground/water collision with object
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Company maintenance personnel › Taxispeed, high
- Company maintenance personnel › Throttle/power control, excessive
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The Boeing 757 was parked at the gate with passengers aboard when an Airbus that was being taxied struck the Boeing. The Airbus was being taxied to a gate by maintenance technicians. The taxiing mechanic reported that he activated the parking brake and waited for ground personnel and a jet way operator to arrive. After the ground personnel arrived he released the parking brake. The airplane did not move and he advanced the throttles out of their idle detents "a couple of inches, about halfway." The airplane began to move at a "fairly decent speed," and he realized the throttles were still out of the idle detent position. He pulled the throttles back and applied brakes; however, the airplane did not slow and continued until it struck the jet way. Review of the flight data recorder revealed that about 12 seconds after the parking brake was released, the thrust lever angles for both engines were increased to about 17 degrees for about 9 seconds, before they were returned to the idle position. During that time, the engines N1 and N2 speeds increased to about 71, and 85 percent, respectively. The taxiing mechanic stated he was qualified to taxi the Airbus and had taxied the airplane regularly as part of his normal work duties. Review of his training records revealed he had received approximately 5 hours of initial Airbus taxi on-the-job training. However, he did not possess an authorization to taxi the A319. Examination of airplane's brake-steering control unit, and the electronic control units from each engine, did not reveal any evidence of a system failure, which would have contributed to the accident.
Probable cause
Maintenance personnel failure to maintain aircraft control as a result of excessive throttle input.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record NYC03FA039
- Event ID
- 20030129X00123
- Case number
- NYC03FA039
- 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, coordinates. 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: 302e3f567a5efb27827e0df410b951f3e41ca255425486b08c47e10e84441052; retrieved 2026-09-18T15:55:43.392Z.
- The NTSB's operator name is blank for N550NW; the operator shown is the name the NTSB's other records give its FAA operator code, NWAA.