Continental Airlines Flight 1943 belly landing
McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32 · Belly landing due to pilot error
From Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) to George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH)
Event
- NTSB case
- FTW96FA118
- 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
- Unknown
- Survivors
- 87
- 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
- 12
- 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
McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32
- Aircraft type
- McDonnell Douglas DC-9
- 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
- N10556
- Operator
- Continental Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA), Washington, DCTo George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH)
- 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 · flare/touchdown
- 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
- Wheels up landing
- 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 › Go-around, not performed
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
From the Wikipedia article
The Continental Airlines Flight 1943 belly landing (Konchinentaru Kōkū 1943-bin dōtai chakuriku jiko) was an aviation accident that occurred on 19 February 1996. When Continental Airlines Flight 1943 (DC-9-32), from Washington National Airport to Houston Intercontinental Airport, landed at Houston Intercontinental Airport, the landing gear did not operate owing to pilot error, and the aircraft made a belly landing. Of the 5 crew and 82 passengers, 12 suffered minor injuries, but there were no deaths.
The accident aircraft
The accident aircraft, a Douglas DC-9-32 (N10556), made its first flight in 1970 and had accumulated a total of 63,132 flight hours and 58,913 cycles. It was powered by 2 Pratt & Whitney JT8D-9A engines.
Course of the accident
Flight 1943 took off from Washington National Airport at 6:50.
At 8:45 it began its descent from 19,000 ft, and the first officer called for the checklist. The captain checked the 7 items in order but skipped the 4th item, hydraulics. Because the hydraulic pressure had not reached the pressure needed for landing, the flaps and landing gear would not operate even when their levers were moved.
Flight 1943 began its approach to runway 27 at Houston Intercontinental Airport, but because the flaps and landing gear were not down, it was flying at 204 kn instead of the 132 kn at which it should have approached. At 9:00:13 it passed the marker, and the first officer called for flaps 15 but told the captain they had not extended. 25 seconds later the first officer called gear down, and 2 seconds later the sound of the operation was recorded on the flight data recorder. He then asked the captain to begin the landing checklist, but it was not carried out.
The flap lever was moved to 25 degrees, but the landing gear warning sounded. This was because the flap lever had been moved to 25 degrees before the landing gear was locked. When the captain said “Flaps 50 (fifty flaps.)”, the first officer said “The flaps aren't working (I don't have any flaps.)” and then “Shall we go around? (want to take it around?)”, but the captain said “It's fine, keep this speed (no, that's alright. * keep your speed up here about uh)”. 4 seconds later the landing gear warning sounded again, and the first officer told the captain “I can't slow down (I can't slow it down here now.)”, but the captain only replied “You're fine (you're alright.)”.
As the aircraft approached the runway at a somewhat high speed, the ground proximity warning system (GPWS) activated. At 9:01:20 the captain took over the
controls. At this point the aircraft was 12 seconds from touchdown, at a speed of 204 kn and an altitude of 161 ft. At 9:01:32 the aircraft touched down hard on the runway at 193 kn, slid 6,915 ft while throwing off intense sparks, and came to rest on grass 140 ft left of the centreline.
Accident investigation
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigated the accident. According to the CVR, when the flap lever was moved to 15 degrees, both the captain and the first officer seemed to be aware that the flaps had not extended. Distracted by the flaps not extending, and with the approach speed higher than normal and events developing rapidly, the pilots were unable to perform the appropriate actions. In addition, when the first officer had previously served as a flight engineer on an Airbus A300, he had been subjected to an inquiry following a complaint by an A300 captain. The background to this was that the A300 captain supported Continental Airlines' labour union, whereas the A300 flight engineer (the first officer of Flight 1943) did not support the union and did not follow its recommendations. Because of this history, the first officer had become unable to caution the captain firmly.
The pilots did not perform the checklist properly, and because the hydraulic pressure was low, the landing gear did not operate.
Because the landing checklist was not performed, they did not notice that the landing gear had not operated.
Inadequate measures to ensure strict adherence to COA's standard landing procedures.
Similar accidents
On 4 February 1986, Pakistan International Airlines Flight 300 (Boeing 747-282B, AP-AYW), from Karachi International Airport to Islamabad International Airport, made a belly landing at Islamabad International Airport owing to pilot error. All 264 passengers and crew were unharmed.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the Japanese Wikipedia article “コンチネンタル航空1943便胴体着陸事故” (revision 110263401, 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 narrative
The airplane landed wheels up and slid 6,850 feet before coming to rest in grass about 140 feet left of the runway centerline. The cabin began to fill with smoke, and the airplane was evacuated. Investigation showed that because the captain had omitted the 'Hydraulics' item on the in-range checklist and the first officer failed to detect the the error, hydraulic pressure was not available to lower the landing gear and deploy the flaps. Both the captain and the first officer recognized that the flaps had not extended after the flaps were selected to 15 deg. The pilots then failed to perform the landing checklist and to detect the numerous cues alerting them to the status of the landing gear because of their focus on coping with the flap extension problem and the high level of workload as a result of the rapid sequence of events in the final minute of flight. The first officer attempted to communicate his concern about the excessive speed of the approach to the captain. There were deficiencies in Continental Airlines' (COA) oversight of its pilots and the principal operations inspector's oversight of COA. COA was aware of inconsistencies in flightcrew adherence to standard operating procedures within the airline; however, corrective actions taken before the accident had not resolved this problem.
Probable cause
the captain's decision to continue the approach contrary to Continental Airlines (COA) standard operating procedures that mandate a go-around when an approach is unstabilized below 500 feet or a ground proximity warning system alert continues below 200 feet above field elevation. The following factors contributed to the accident: (1) the flightcrew's failure to properly complete the in-range checklist, which resulted in a lack of hydraulic pressure to lower the landing gear and deploy the flaps; (2) the flightcrew's failure to perform the landing checklist and confirm that the landing gear was extended; (3) the inadequate remedial actions by COA to ensure adherence to standard operating procedures; and (4) the Federal Aviation Administration's inadequate oversight of COA to ensure adherence to standard operating procedures. (NTSB Report AAR-97/01)
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
Japanese Wikipedia article: コンチネンタル航空1943便胴体着陸事故
- Article
- コンチネンタル航空1943便胴体着陸事故
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 110263401 · 2026-07-13 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q56347413
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record FTW96FA118
- Event ID
- 20001208X05238
- Case number
- FTW96FA118
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Where each value comes from
- Record
- ja Wikipedia article "コンチネンタル航空1943便胴体着陸事故" (page 3820269, revision 110263401), translated into English with AI assistance; merged with NTSB case FTW96FA118 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- NTSB record FTW96FA118: NTSB API eventDate, eventTimeUtc and eventTimeUtcOffsetHours (local date)
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record FTW96FA118
- Map position
- NTSB record FTW96FA118: events decimal coordinates
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record FTW96FA118: 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 FTW96FA118: operated under Part 121: Air Carrier
- Fatalities
- NTSB record FTW96FA118: NTSB API totalFatal
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record FTW96FA118: NTSB API ongroundFatal
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (3)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "Continental Airlines Flight 1943 belly landing" and NTSB case FTW96FA118, 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.