American Eagle Flight 5456
Executive Air Charter CASA 212 · Loss of control due to reverse thrust activation
From Luis Munoz Marin International Airport (TSJU) to Eugenio Maria De Hostos Airport (MAZ)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA92MA131
- 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
- 5 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- Occupants
- 5
- Survivors
- 0
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 0 serious · 0 minor (NTSB)
- 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
- Charter & commuter
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
CASA 212
- Flight
- OW5456
- Aircraft type
- Casa 212
- 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
- N355CA
- Operator
- Executive Air Charter
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Luis Munoz Marin International Airport (TSJU), San Juan, PRTo Eugenio Maria De Hostos Airport (MAZ)
- 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 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- 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
- 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
- Loss of control in flight
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Copilot/second pilot › Powerplant controls, inadvertent activation
- Throttle/power lever › Undetermined
Approximate · Coordinates from the Wikipedia article; not checked against an investigation report.
From the Wikipedia article
American Eagle Flight 5456, officially operating as Executive Air Charter Flight 5456, was a scheduled commuter flight between Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico and Eugenio María de Hostos Airport in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico. The flight was operated by Executive Airlines, dba American Eagle, and was operated by a CASA C-212 aircraft. On June 7, 1992, the plane crashed during heavy rain into a swamp short of the runway, killing all 5 people on board.
Accident
While on approach into Eugenio María de Hostos Airport in Puerto Rico, the first officer inadvertently pulled the power levers into the beta position, (otherwise known was reverse thrust), causing the aircraft to start rapidly descending and eventually impacting a swamp. The impact killed all 5 people on board.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
When word of the accident spread to the NTSB, an investigation was immediately started, which ended up lasting 3 months and 4 years. The investigation determined that the beta blocking device had failed after being heavily corroded, causing the failure and the first officer inadvertently causing the engines to go into beta mode, leading to a loss of control that ended up killing everyone. The probable cause read as follows:"The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause of this accident to be the failure of the beta blocking device for undetermined reasons, and the second-pilot's inadvertent activation of the power lever, or levers, aft of the flight idle position and into the beta range, resulting in a loss of airplane."
Text from the Wikipedia article “American Eagle Flight 5456” (revision 1355768882, retrieved 2026-09-18) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out. Read the article
NTSB narrative
THE AIRPLANE CRASHED ON APCH 3/4 MI SW OF THE ARPT. A WITNESS HEARD SOUND HE ASSOCIATED WITH PROPS GOING INTO REVERSE, THEN OBSERVED AIRPLANE EMERGE FROM CLOUDS IN A NOSE-LOW ATTITUDE. CVR TAPE REVEALED SOUND OF AN ABRUPT CHANGE IN FREQ & AMPLITUDE 10 SECS PRIOR TO IMPACT. EXAM OF THE LEFT ENG BETA INDICATOR LAMP REVEALED HEAVY OXIDE DEPOSIT & STRETCHED COILS INDICATIVE OF THE LAMP BEING ILLUMINATED AT IMPACT; RIGHT ENG BETA LAMP WAS DESTROYED. POWER LEVERS AND (BETA MODE) TRIGGER LOCKS OPERATED NORMALLY; TRIGGER RETURN SPRINGS INTACT. FLIGHT IDLE STOPS SHOWED NO EVIDENCE OF EXCESSIVE WEAR OR DEFORMATION. THE POWER LEVER (BETA) BLOCKING DEVICE LOCKOUT SOLENOID WAS TESTED ELECTRICALLY AND FUNCTIONED NORMALLY. THE RIGGING OF THE BETA LOCKOUT DEVICE COULD NOT BE CHECKED DUE TO IMPACT DAMAGE. THE OPERATOR CONDUCTED A FUNCT TEST OF THE ELECTRICAL OR BACKUP BETA BLOCKING DEVICES ON THE REMAINING 8 CASA 212 AIRPLANES; 3 WERE FOUND TO BE INOPERATIVE. NEITHER THE MFGR NOR OPERATOR HAD AN INSPECTION OR FUNCT TEST REQUIREMENT FOR THE BLOCKING DEVICES.
Probable cause
THE FAILURE OF THE BETA BLOCKING DEVICE FOR UNDETERMINED REASON(S), AND THE SECOND-PILOT'S INADVERTENT ACTIVATION OF THE POWER LEVER, OR LEVERS, AFT OF THE FLIGHT IDLE POSITION AND INTO THE BETA RANGE, RESULTING IN A LOSS OF AIRPLANE CONTROL.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
Wikipedia article: American Eagle Flight 5456
- Article
- American Eagle Flight 5456
- Revision
- 1355768882 · 2026-05-23 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q4743650
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record MIA92MA131
- Event ID
- 20001211X14941
- Case number
- MIA92MA131
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "American Eagle Flight 5456" (page 32528533, revision 1355768882); merged with NTSB case MIA92MA131 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- NTSB record MIA92MA131: NTSB API eventDate, eventTimeUtc and eventTimeUtcOffsetHours (local date)
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record MIA92MA131
- Map position
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia article coordinates
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record MIA92MA131: aircraft; gaps from Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- NTSB record MIA92MA131: operated under Part 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- Fatalities
- NTSB record MIA92MA131: NTSB API totalFatal
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record MIA92MA131: NTSB API ongroundFatal
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (3)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "American Eagle Flight 5456" and NTSB case MIA92MA131, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this US event the NTSB's values are used where the two differ; each value names its source.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. 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.