Millon Air Flight 406
Boeing 707-323C · Engine failure on takeoff
From Eloy Alfaro International Airport (MEC) to Miami International Airport (MIA)
Event
- NTSB case
- MIA97RA011
- 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
- Unknown · led by another country; figures from NTSB notifications
- Event fatalities
- 34 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 30
- Occupants
- 4
- 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
- 50 · all on the ground
- 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
- Not recorded
Boeing 707-323C
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 707
- Category
- Airplane · from aircraft type
- 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
- N751MA
- Operator
- Millon Air
- Onboard fatalities
- 4
- Route
- From Eloy Alfaro International Airport (MEC)To Miami International Airport (MIA)
- 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
- 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
- Not recorded
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
From the investigation findings the Wikipedia article reports, sorted into the NTSB's cause areas with AI assistance.
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Manta, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
From the Wikipedia article
Millon Air Flight 406 was an international cargo flight from Manta, Ecuador, to Miami, Florida. On October 22, 1996, the Boeing 707 crashed shortly after takeoff from Manta Airport, killing all four people on-board and 30 more people on the ground.
Accident
The aircraft captain, Erwin Roedenbeck, had been working for Millon Air for three years and was also qualified as a flight instructor. Also on board was 23-year-old first officer, Henry Ripoll, 30-year-old flight engineer Ernesto Enciso, and a loadmaster. Flight 406 was loaded with cargo, including frozen fish.
At 21:44 CDT, Flight 406 took off from Runway 23. The aircraft quickly lost altitude and struck the La Dolorosa Catholic church's bell tower. The aircraft then crashed into a residential area near the airport and exploded, scattered debris over dozens of homes. The accident killed all four people on board along with at least 24 (or 30) people on the ground, including a priest from the church. 50 people were also injured.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
Ecuador's Civil Aviation Authority investigated the accident with assistance from the National Transportation Safety Board, Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Boeing, and Pratt & Whitney. Investigators ultimately determined that the cause of the accident was an engine failure.
Miami-based Millon Air had several maintenance violations. It was issued more than 50 warnings from the FAA during some ten-year period, and paid $49,000 in fines. A year earlier, a Douglas DC-8-54F leased to Faucett Perú crashed in Guatemala City, killing six people. After the accident, Millon Air ceased operations voluntarily.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Millon Air Flight 406” (revision 1363908774, 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
Sources
Wikipedia article: Millon Air Flight 406
- Article
- Millon Air Flight 406
- Revision
- 1363908774 · 2026-07-13 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q90500265
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record MIA97RA011
- Event ID
- 20001208X06952
- Case number
- MIA97RA011
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "Millon Air Flight 406" (page 75951537, revision 1363908774); merged with NTSB case MIA97RA011 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- NTSB record MIA97RA011: centre of the town the record names (GeoNames, CC BY 4.0)
- Aircraft, operator and route
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports); gaps and aircraft details from NTSB record MIA97RA011
- Operation
- flight number in the article title
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia infobox: total_fatalities
- Ground fatalities
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia infobox: ground fatalities
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (2)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "Millon Air Flight 406" and NTSB case MIA97RA011, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this event outside the United States Wikipedia'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: local date. Values present in the bulk record are kept.