Southwest Airlines Flight 311
Boeing 737-8H4 · Accident: turbulence encounter on approach
From Dallas Love Field (KDAL) to Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport (KECP)
Event
- NTSB case
- DCA25LA241
- 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
- Unknown
Boeing 737-8H4
- 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
- N8685B
- Operator
- Southwest Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Dallas Love Field (KDAL), Dallas, TXTo Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport (KECP), Panama City, FL
- Aircraft age
- About 9 years (built 2016)
- 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
- 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
- Turbulence encounter
- 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
- Environmental issues › Conditions/weather/phenomena
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
Southwest Airlines flight 311 encountered unanticipated severe turbulence while descending through a thin cloud layer. The flight originated from Dallas Love Field Airport (DAL), Dallas, Texas, with a planned destination of Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport (ECP), Panama City, Florida. Prior to departure, the captain briefed the flight attendants (FAs) to remain seated during departure, due to cumulous cloud buildups and anticipated turbulence. While climbing to 37,000 ft (FL370), the flight encountered occasional light chop. After leveling off, the flight crew informed the FAs that they could perform their duties as assigned and turned the fasten seat belt sign off. According to the flight crew, during initial descent, at approximately FL340, the first officer made a public address (PA) announcement indicating that they had started their initial descent, to return to their seats and fasten their seatbelts for the remainder of the flight. The captain observed scattered cumulous clouds ahead of their flight path at approximately FL200 and told the FAs to secure the cabin and be seated early. The airplane descended through FL290 in a hazy cloud layer and encountered approximately 10-15 seconds of turbulence. During the turbulence encounter the autopilot disconnected, the airspeed fluctuated, and the airplane shook. The flight crew leveled off at FL270 and contacted the FAs. The flight crew were informed that several passengers and FAs were injured during the event. The flight crew notified company dispatch and air traffic control (ATC) of the turbulence encounter and the injuries. The remainder of the flight was uneventful. After parking at the gate, emergency medical services (EMS) met the airplane and transported three FAs and four passengers to the hospital for examination. One FA was diagnosed with a right ankle fracture and underwent surgery. Ten minor injuries were also reported and there was no damage to the airplane.
Probable cause
The airplane’s encounter with unanticipated turbulence during descent, resulting in a serious injury to a flight attendant.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record DCA25LA241
- Event ID
- 20250623200379
- Case number
- DCA25LA241
- 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, cause areas, damage. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the UTC date the NTSB stores; the local time zone is not recorded, so the local date may differ by a day.
- API snapshot SHA-256: b235de3b9cb78ede1a298f645c0c53457c24b0af198c7e87c0cc457bbebf4be3; retrieved 2026-09-16T19:59:51.198Z.