Japan Air Lines Flight 813
Douglas DC-8 · Uncontained engine failure due to maintenance error
From San Francisco International Airport (SFO) to Tokyo Haneda International Airport (HND)
Event
- 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
- Event fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- Occupants
- 41
- Survivors
- 41
- 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
- Airline
- 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
Douglas DC-8
- Flight
- JL813
- Aircraft type
- Douglas DC-8
- 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
- JA-8006
- Operator
- Japan Air Lines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From San Francisco International Airport (SFO)To Tokyo Haneda International Airport (HND)
- 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 (scheduled international passenger service)
- 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
- En route · climb to cruise
- 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
- Engine failure or malfunction
- 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
- Miscellaneous acts, conditions › Improperly installed
- Personnel › Improper maintenance (maintenance personnel)
- Personnel › Inadequate inspection of aircraft (maintenance personnel)
- Powerplant › Other
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of San Francisco, CA, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
From the Wikipedia article
On December 25, 1965, Japan Air Lines Flight 813 en route from San Francisco International Airport to Haneda Airport experienced an uncontained engine failure in its number one engine shortly after takeoff. The crew made an emergency landing at Metropolitan Oakland International Airport across the San Francisco Bay. All 41 passengers and crew managed to survive without any injuries.
Accident
At 13:08 PST, the aircraft took off from Runway 01 at San Francisco International Airport. At 13:11, while climbing at 270 knots (500 km/h) and approximately 4,500 feet (1,400 m), the No. 1 engine exploded. The aircraft vibrated violently and rolled to the left. The pilots immediately performed the engine failure checklist, and the vibrations subsided. There was a fire in the No. 1 engine, but the engine was not visible from the cockpit, and no fire warnings were issued. The pilots learned of the fire through a flight attendant's report.
Within a minute of the engine explosion, the pilot declared a mayday and requested permission to make an emergency landing, at which point lateral control was becoming difficult and hydraulic pressure was decreasing.
At 13:16, the captain decided to head for Runway 29 at Metropolitan Oakland International Airport, which offered a more direct approach, rather than making a left turn to return to San Francisco International Airport. At 13:20, the aircraft successfully landed on Runway 29. None of the 41 occupants onboard were injured.
Investigation and cause
Final report
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), which investigated the accident, determined that the cause of the accident was failure of an operator to properly secure the torque ring on the low-pressure compressor during an engine inspection and overhaul.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Japan Air Lines Flight 813” (revision 1339308986, 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 remarks
NO.1 ENG LOW PRESSURE COMPRESSOR SECTION TORQUE RING FAILED,IMPROPERLY SECURED DURING ENG OVERHAUL
NTSB's remark from its 1962–1981 archive, as recorded (abbreviated, at most 98 characters): the archive has no narrative
Sources
Wikipedia article: Japan Air Lines Flight 813
- Article
- Japan Air Lines Flight 813
- Revision
- 1339308986 · 2026-02-19 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q97376136
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record
- Event ID
- 19651225P005439
- Case number
- Unknown
- Dataset
- historical-pre1982
- Source SHA-256
- abe1a933b4b73583d61684309f7f0610c281e3c1de3537c6471bf2a98ba6481d
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "Japan Air Lines Flight 813" (page 79641535, revision 1339308986); merged with NTSB case NTSB19651225P005439 (PRE1982 tblFirstHalf (one row per aircraft, grouped by date, place and time))
- Date
- NTSB record NTSB19651225P005439: PRE1982 DATE_OCCURRENCE
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record NTSB19651225P005439
- Map position
- NTSB record NTSB19651225P005439: centre of the town the record names (GeoNames, CC BY 4.0)
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record NTSB19651225P005439: PRE1982 REGIST_NO, ACFT_MAKE, ACFT_MODEL; gaps from Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- NTSB record NTSB19651225P005439: operated under Part 121: Air carrier (scheduled intl passg service)
- Fatalities
- NTSB record NTSB19651225P005439: PRE1982 TOTAL_ABRD_FATAL of each aircraft, plus people on the ground and others outside the aircraft
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record NTSB19651225P005439: events.inj_f_grnd
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (4)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "Japan Air Lines Flight 813" and NTSB case NTSB19651225P005439, 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.
- From NTSB's 1962-1981 archive (PRE1982), which holds at most a short remark (98 characters, abbreviated) instead of a narrative; the accident type, phase of flight, causes and conditions are NTSB's codes, decoded as the archive defines them.
- Reviewed means this record passed the site's consistency check, not that it was checked against a narrative or report - there is none to check against.
- The operation category is mapped from the archive's operator and operation codes and has not been reviewed.