American Airlines Flight 102
Douglas DC-10-30 · Runway excursion
From Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL) to Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW)
Event
- NTSB case
- DCA93MA040
- 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
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- Occupants
- 202
- Survivors
- 202
- 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
- 40
- 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
- Instrument Meteorological Cond
Douglas DC-10-30
- Flight
- AA102
- Aircraft type
- Douglas DC-10
- 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
- N139AA
- Operator
- American Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL), Honolulu, HITo Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW)
- 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
- Landing · landing roll
- 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 on ground/water
- 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
- Pilot in command › Directional control, not maintained
Approximate · Estimated position: Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, the airport the Wikipedia article names as the site. Where on or near it is not known.
From the Wikipedia article
American Airlines Flight 102 was a regularly scheduled flight operated by a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 from Honolulu International Airport to Dallas Fort Worth International Airport. On 14 April 1993, upon landing, it was raining at Dallas-Ft Worth International Airport, and there were numerous thunderstorms in the area. Shortly after touchdown on runway 17L, the pilot lost directional control as the aircraft began to weathervane, and it departed the right side of the runway. All 202 occupants on board survived, with two passengers suffering serious injuries during the emergency evacuation. The aircraft was badly damaged and was written off.
The National Transportation Safety Board concluded that the cause of the accident was the failure of the captain to use proper directional control technique during the landing roll.
Flight crew
The aircraft had a flight crew of three. The captain, 59-year-old Kenneth Kruslyak, had a total of 12,562 flight hours, 555 of which were in the DC-10. He was employed by American Airlines on August 1, 1966, and was designated as a captain in the DC-10 in November 1991. Kruslyak held an Airline Transport Pilot Certificate and was type rated in the DC-10, Boeing 727, and DC-9, with a commercial type rating in the Boeing 377. The first officer, 40-year-old David Harrell, had 4,454 flight hours with American Airlines, 554 of which were in the DC-10. The flight engineer, 60-year-old Francis Roggenbuck, held a current Flight Engineer certificate. He was employed by American Airlines in October 1955. Roggenbuck had a total of 20,000 flight hours, all of which were as a flight engineer, and 4,800 hours of which were in the DC-10.
Crash
As the aircraft landed, it began to weathervane and departed the right side of runway 17L. The aircraft dug into deep mud, collapsing the nose landing gear, and damaging the left engine and the left wing. A small fire was quickly extinguished by firefighters who arrived from a nearby airport fire station. The aircraft came to rest along an adjacent taxiway and was steeply tilted to one side, causing some evacuation slides to deploy improperly; during the ensuing emergency evacuation, two passengers fell from the slides, suffering serious injuries. Three crew and 35 passengers suffered minor injuries in the crash and emergency evacuation.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
The National Transportation Safety Board concluded that the cause of the accident was:
Text from the Wikipedia article “American Airlines Flight 102” (revision 1356494016, 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
AT THE TIME FLIGHT 102 LANDED AT DFW AIRPORT, IT WAS RAINING AND THERE WERE NUMEROUS THUNDERSTORMS IN THE AREA. SHORTLY AFTER TOUCHDOWN ON RUNWAY 17 LEFT, THE PILOT LOSS DIRECTIONAL CONTROL WHEN THE AIRPLANE BEGAN TO WEATHERVANE AND THE CAPTAIN FAILED TO USE SUFFICIENT RUDDER CONTROL TO REGAIN THE PROPER GROUND TRACK. THE AIRPLANE EVENTUALLY DEPARTED THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE RUNWAY. AT THE TIME OF LANDING THE WIND (A CROSS WIND) WAS BLOWING AT 15 KNOTS WITH GUSTS APPROXIMATELY 5 KNOTS ABOVE THE STEADY WIND SPEED.
Probable cause
THE NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD DETERMINES THAT THE PROBABLE CAUSE OF THE ACCIDENT WAS THE FAILURE OF THE CAPTAIN TO USE PROPER DIRECTIONAL CONTROL TECHNIQUES TO MAINTAIN THE AIRPLANE ON THE RUNWAY.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
Wikipedia article: American Airlines Flight 102
- Article
- American Airlines Flight 102
- Revision
- 1356494016 · 2026-05-28 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q111948125
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record DCA93MA040
- Event ID
- 20001211X12108
- Case number
- DCA93MA040
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "American Airlines Flight 102" (page 70168872, revision 1356494016); merged with NTSB case DCA93MA040 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- NTSB record DCA93MA040: NTSB API eventDate, eventTimeUtc and eventTimeUtcOffsetHours (local date)
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record DCA93MA040
- Map position
- Wikipedia: airport the Wikipedia infobox site links (Wikidata code, OurAirports)
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record DCA93MA040: 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 DCA93MA040: operated under Part 121: Air Carrier
- Fatalities
- NTSB record DCA93MA040: NTSB API totalFatal
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record DCA93MA040: NTSB API ongroundFatal
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (3)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "American Airlines Flight 102" and NTSB case DCA93MA040, 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.