Southwest Airlines Boeing 737-7H4 accident
Boeing 737-7H4 and American Airlines Boeing 737-823 · Accident: ground collision while taxiing
Event
- NTSB case
- DCA22LA201
- 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
- Event fatalities
- Unknown
- 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
Aircraft 1 · Boeing 737-7H4
- 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
- N963WN
- Operator
- Southwest Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Denver International Airport (KDEN), Denver, COTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 11 years (built 2011)
- 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 · from runway
- Defining eventThe 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
- Ground collision
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Minor
Aircraft 2 · Boeing 737-823
- 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
- N909NN
- Operator
- American Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Orlando International Airport (KMCO), Orlando, FLTo not recorded
- Aircraft age
- About 10 years (built 2012)
- 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
- Not recorded
- Defining eventThe 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
- Not recorded
- 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
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
Approximate · Coordinates from the NTSB case API, which marks them as estimated or does not say; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
After landing on runway 27R at Chicago O’Hare International Airport, Southwest Airlines B737 flight 2659 (SWA2659) was cleared by ground control to taxi to gate M-14 via taxiways Z, D, TT, A, A-19. As they proceeded down taxiway A, both pilots observed an American Airlines B737 (AA1121) holding short of taxiway A-19. The pilots of SWA2659 asked ground control for permission to utilize taxiway A-20 instead and were granted permission. The captain said that as he tried to pass AA1121, he stayed left of centerline to ensure wingtip clearance. The first officer was looking out the window and informed the captain that their airplane’s wingtip was clear. However, their right winglet impacted the left elevator of AA1121. AA1121 was stationary on taxiway A and holding short of taxiway A-19 with the parking brake set, awaiting entry to gate K-20, when it was impacted by SWA2659.
Figure 1. Depiction of SWA2659 taxi route and area of occurrence (Adapted from Google Earth)
Post-event examination of both airplanes revealed that the right winglet of SWA2659 was damaged and sheared off by the impact and the left elevator of AA1121 was substantially damaged.
Probable cause
Southwest Airlines flight crew’s misjudgment of the distance required to safely pass the American Airlines airplane.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DCA22LA201
- Event ID
- 20220915105950
- Case number
- DCA22LA201
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
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, coordinates, cause areas. 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: 5f75904fec24c757571396801cbab156388c82ea0a74e7090224c6984c2ca52c; retrieved 2026-09-13T18:38:50.311Z.