East Coast Jets Flight 81
Raytheon Corporate Jets BAE 125-800A · Runway excursion on landing after failed go-around attempt, pilot error
From Atlantic City International Airport (ACY) to Owatonna Degner Regional Airport (OWA)
Event
- NTSB case
- DCA08MA085
- 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
- 8 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- 8
- 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
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Raytheon Corporate Jets BAE 125-800A
- Aircraft type
- Raytheon Corporate Jets BAE-125
- 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
- N818MV
- Operator
- East Coast Jets
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Atlantic City International Airport (ACY), Atlantic City, NJTo Owatonna Degner Regional Airport (OWA), Owatonna, 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 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
- Landing · aborted after touchdown
- 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
- Collision during takeoff/landing
- 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
- 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.
From the Wikipedia article
East Coast Jets Flight 81 was a business jet flight operated by East Coast Jets that crashed on July 31, 2008 while attempting a go-around at Owatonna Degner Regional Airport near Owatonna, Minnesota, killing all eight occupants on board. The flight originated in Atlantic City International Airport, and was scheduled to land in Owatonna. The crew made a go-around attempt after the aircraft touched down, but it overran the runway, hit the instrument landing system localizer antenna at an altitude of approximately 5 ft, stalled and crashed, with the main wreckage coming to rest 2400 ft from the runway end.
Flight
After first traveling from its base airport at Lehigh Valley International Airport to Atlantic City to pick up passengers, East Coast Jets Flight 81 departed from Atlantic City International Airport at 8:13 am, en route to its destination, Owatonna Degner Regional Airport in Minnesota.
Accident
At 9:45 am, Flight 81 was cleared for landing, and the aircraft touched down on assigned runway 30. Noticing that insufficient runway length remained for the jet to stop, the crew decided to go around. As it began to take off again, the aircraft overran the end of the runway, and the right wing impacted elements of the Approach Lighting System. This caused the aircraft to bank hard to the right until it was upside down before crashing into a cornfield 2400 ft from the runway. Seven occupants died on impact. One passenger initially survived the crash, but she died less than two hours later in a hospital.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators concluded that the aircraft crashed due to a failed go-around. As the jet had no flight data recorder on board, NTSB investigators used the aircraft's cockpit voice recorder and eyewitness accounts. Possible hydroplaning due to the wet runway was discussed but ruled out later on. Investigators determined that the pilots had not begun the go-around earlier before overrunning Runway 30. The pilots failed to apply full brakes and moved the airbrake handle to the OPEN position (airbrakes only partially extended) instead of first selecting flaps 45 degrees and then the proper airbrake DUMP position (making airbrakes fully extended and flaps extended further to 75 degrees) during the landing, which would have safely brought the aircraft to a stop even after it overran the runway. The pilots were also criticized because they continued their attempt to go-around after overrunning the runway. The NTSB cited the pilots' error in attempting a go-around as the primary cause of the accident, concluding that the aircraft would have come to rest within the runway safety margins. The NTSB cited other contributing causes and issued a series of recommendations.
Probable cause
The NTSB's final report states the following:
The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the captain's decision to attempt a go-around late in the landing roll with insufficient runway remaining. Contributing to the accident were, 1, the pilots' poor crew coordination and lack of cockpit discipline; 2, fatigue, which likely impaired both pilots' performance; and 3, the failure of the Federal Aviation Administration to require crew resource management training and standard operating procedures for Part 135 operators.
The NTSB issued 14 Safety Recommendations as a result of this accident.
Text from the Wikipedia article “East Coast Jets Flight 81” (revision 1336117558, 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 Safety Board’s full report is available at http://www.ntsb.gov/publictn/A_Acc1.htm. The Aircraft Accident Report number is NTSB/AAR-11/01.
On July 31, 2008, about 0945 central daylight time, East Coast Jets flight 81, a Hawker Beechcraft Corporation 125-800A airplane, N818MV, crashed while attempting to go around after landing on runway 30 at Owatonna Degner Regional Airport, Owatonna, Minnesota. The two pilots and six passengers were killed, and the airplane was destroyed by impact forces. The nonscheduled, domestic passenger flight was operating under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 135. An instrument flight rules flight plan had been filed and activated; however, it was canceled before the landing. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed at the time of the accident.
Probable cause
The captain’s decision to attempt a go-around late in the landing roll with insufficient runway remaining. Contributing to the accident were (1) the pilots’ poor crew coordination and lack of cockpit discipline; (2) fatigue, which likely impaired both pilots’ performance; and (3) the failure of the Federal Aviation Administration to require crew resource management training and standard operating procedures for Part 135 operators.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
Wikipedia article: East Coast Jets Flight 81
- Article
- East Coast Jets Flight 81
- Revision
- 1336117558 · 2026-02-02 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q30643510
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record DCA08MA085
- Event ID
- 20080806X01166
- Case number
- DCA08MA085
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "East Coast Jets Flight 81" (page 54223864, revision 1336117558); merged with NTSB case DCA08MA085 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- NTSB record DCA08MA085: NTSB narrative opening date, consistent with the API date and time (local date)
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record DCA08MA085
- Map position
- NTSB record DCA08MA085: NTSB API eventLatitude/eventLongitude
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record DCA08MA085: 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 DCA08MA085: operated under Part 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
- Fatalities
- NTSB record DCA08MA085: NTSB API totalFatal
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record DCA08MA085: events.inj_f_grnd
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (3)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "East Coast Jets Flight 81" and NTSB case DCA08MA085, 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, 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.