Modern Air Transport accident near Acapulco
Convair CV-990-30A-8 Coronado · The 1970 Modern Air Transport accident occurred on 8 August 1970
From Mexico City Benito Juárez International Airport (MEX) to General Juan N. Álvarez International Airport (ACA)
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
- Unknown
- Occupants
- Unknown
- Survivors
- 8
- 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
- 8
- 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
Convair CV-990-30A-8 Coronado
- Aircraft type
- Convair CV-990
- 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
- N5603
- Operator
- Modern Air Transport
- Onboard fatalities
- 0
- Route
- From Mexico City Benito Juárez International Airport (MEX)To General Juan N. Álvarez International Airport (ACA)
- 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
- Not recorded
- 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
- 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
- Undershoot
- 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
From the investigation findings the Wikipedia article reports, sorted into the NTSB's cause areas with AI assistance.
Not plotted · Not plotted: the Wikipedia article gives no coordinates, and its site names no town or airport that matches exactly.
From the Wikipedia article
The 1970 Modern Air Transport accident occurred on 8 August 1970. On that day, a Modern Air Transport Convair CV-990-30A-8 Coronado that had taken off from Mexico City Airport and was on a positioning flight collided with terrain on final approach to Acapulco Airport. All eight crew members on board were injured in the accident, one of whom later died.
Accident sequence
During the night-time final approach using the instrument landing system to Acapulco-General Juan N. Alvarez Airport, the crew did not realise that they had descended below the minimum safe altitude. The aircraft collided with the approach lights, crashed to the ground shortly before the runway threshold and caught fire.
Investigation and cause
Cause
The reason why the crew descended below the minimum safe altitude could not be determined.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the German Wikipedia article “Flugunfall der Modern Air Transport bei Acapulco” (revision 269044886, retrieved 2026-09-19) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out; the translation may contain errors, and long articles were cut to their first 700 words. Read the article
NTSB remarks
INVESTIGATION UNDER THE JURISDICTION OF THE GOVTOF MEXICO.
NTSB's remark from its 1962–1981 archive, as recorded (abbreviated, at most 98 characters): the archive has no narrative
Sources
German Wikipedia article: Flugunfall der Modern Air Transport bei Acapulco
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 269044886 · 2026-07-23 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q110367865
- 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
- 19700808P033628
- Case number
- Unknown
- Dataset
- historical-pre1982
- Source SHA-256
- abe1a933b4b73583d61684309f7f0610c281e3c1de3537c6471bf2a98ba6481d
Where each value comes from
- Record
- de Wikipedia article "Flugunfall der Modern Air Transport bei Acapulco" (page 12046104, revision 269044886), translated into English with AI assistance; merged with NTSB case NTSB19700808P033628 (PRE1982 tblFirstHalf (one row per aircraft, grouped by date, place and time))
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- Wikipedia: none
- 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 NTSB19700808P033628
- Operation
- Reviewed correction (2026-09-26): A Modern Air Transport jet on a positioning flight with only crew aboard: an air transport operator's own positioning flight counts as airline. The article: "a Modern Air Transport Convair CV-990-30A-8 Coronado that had taken off from Mexico City Airport and was on a positioning flight"
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities
- Ground fatalities
- Wikipedia: not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Summary
- Wikipedia article lead
Source notes (4)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "Modern Air Transport accident near Acapulco" and NTSB case NTSB19700808P033628, 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.
- 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.