Mexicana de Aviación Flight 940
Mexicana de Aviación Flight 940, operated by Mexicana de Aviación, was a scheduled international flight from Mexico City to Los Angeles with stopovers in Puerto Vallarta and Mazatlán on March 31, 1986, utilizing a Boeing 727-200 registered as XA-MEM,[1][2] when the plane crashed into El Carbón, a mountain in the Sierra Madre Occidental mountain range northwest of Mexico City, killing everyone on board.[1][3] With 167 deaths, the crash of Flight 940 is the deadliest aviation disaster ever on Mexican soil, and the deadliest involving a Boeing 727.[2][4]
Background
The aircraft involved was delivered to Mexicana in 1981[5] and was named "Veracruz". The plane was commanded by Captain Carlos Alberto Guadarrama Sixtos, who joined Mexicana in December 1971, clocked a number of 6,328 hours of total flying experience. The first officer was Philip Louis Piaget Rhorer, hired by Mexicana in April 1980, he had a little over 1,769 total flying hours. And the second officer, Ángel Carlos Peñasco Espinoza, was hired by Mexicana in 1982, and had a total of 1,142 total flying hours.[1] The crew of eight included five flight attendants. The wife of Captain Guadarrama, who was a retired flight attendant, and Guadarrama's son and daughter were also among the 159 passengers on board.[6] At 08:50 local time, the plane took off from Benito Juárez International Airport en route to Los Angeles International Airport with scheduled stopovers in Puerto Vallarta and Mazatlán.[7] The plane carried 147 passengers (139 passengers and 8 crew members) from Mexico, 8 from France, 6 from the United States, 4 from Sweden, and 2 from Canada.[8]
Nationality | Passengers | Crew | Total |
---|---|---|---|
Mexico | 139 | 8 | 147 |
France | 8 | 0 | 8 |
United States | 6 | 0 | 6 |
Sweden | 4 | 0 | 4 |
Canada | 2 | 0 | 2 |
Total | 159 | 8 | 167 |
Crash
At 09:05, fifteen minutes after takeoff, an explosion rocked the fuselage. Captain Guadarrama and the crew in the cockpit, realizing that the plane was shaking too much, declared an emergency and asked to return to Benito Juárez International Airport.[9] The airport was prepared for an emergency landing. However, the aircraft crashed into El Carbón mountain near the town of Maravatío, Michoacán, broke in two and burst into flames.[9] All 167 passengers and crew were killed upon impact.[3] Among the dead were two film scouts for the horror film Predator. Eyewitnesses reported details of the crash to authorities. The local police and the Mexican army were dispatched to the crash site.[10]
Investigation
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/ae/Sierra_Madre_Occidental.jpg/220px-Sierra_Madre_Occidental.jpg)
Initially, two Middle Eastern terrorist groups claimed responsibility for this crash, along with the bombing of TWA Flight 840, which occurred two days later. An anonymous letter signed by those groups claimed that a suicide mission had sabotaged the plane in retaliation against the United States.[11][12] However, sabotage was later dismissed as a cause of the crash. The investigations were carried out by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and Mexican aeronautical authorities, who found the cause of the accident to be an LH main landing gear tire filled with compressed air, instead of nitrogen.[9] In addition, the tire had some marks of overheating. The investigators later found that the overheating was caused by a malfunctioning brake on the landing gear.[12]
Aftermath
Mexicana maintenance personnel were blamed for negligence in maintaining the 727 and for filling the tire with compressed air, instead of nitrogen. About a year after the crash, the U.S. FAA released an Airworthiness Directive[13] requiring the use of dry nitrogen (or other gases shown to be inert) when filling the tires on braked wheels of most commercial airliners. The crash remains the deadliest airline disaster in Mexican history[14] and is the world's deadliest air disaster involving the Boeing 727. The cause of the in-flight fire is believed to be the rupture of fuel lines by the exploding tire.[2]
See also
- Nigeria Airways Flight 2120 - A similar crash where under-inflated tyres overheated and started a fire onboard which destroyed vital hydraulic and control cables leading to a loss of control
- Air France Flight 4590 - A 2000 Concorde crash caused by an in-flight fire triggered by tire burst on takeoff
- Swissair Flight 306 - A 1963 crash caused by an inflight fire triggered by a landing gear failure on takeoff
- ValuJet Flight 592 - A 1996 crash caused by an inflight fire in the cargo hold
- Propair Flight 420, another aircraft where a fire started in the left wheel well of a Fairchild Metroliner.
References
- ^ a b c "INFORME Y DICTAMEN DE ACCIDENTE – 31 DE MARZO DE 1986 – AERONAVE BOEING 727-200 MATRICULA XA-MEM – CERRO DE SAN MIGUEL EL ALTO, MUNICIPIO DE MARAVATIO, ESTADO DE MICHOACAN" [ACCIDENT REPORT AND FINDINGS - 31 MARCH 1986 - AIRCRAFT BOEING 727-200 REGISTRATION XA-MEM - CERRO DE SAN MIGUEL EL ALTO, MUNICIPALITY OF MARAVATIO, STATE OF MICHOACAN] (PDF) (Final report) (in Spanish). Federal Civil Aviation Agency, Mexico. Retrieved 27 July 2024 – via Aviation Safety Network.
- ^ a b c Ranter, Harro. "ASN Aircraft accident Boeing 727-264 XA-MEM Las Mesas". Aviation Safety Network. Flight Safety Foundation. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ a b Seiler, Michael (April 1, 1986). "All 166 on Jet Die in Mexican Crash". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ Ranter, Harro. "Boeing 727". Aviation Safety Network. Flight Safety Foundation. Retrieved 2018-11-20.
- ^ "XA-MEM - Boeing 727-264(Adv) - 22414". JetPhotos. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ "Pilot's Family Killed, Wife Had Survived Earlier Crash With Mexico-Plane". www.apnewsarchive.com. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ "La mayor tragedia aérea en el país; 166 personas murieron hace 30 años" [The greatest air tragedy in the country; 166 people died 30 years ago] (in Spanish). 31 March 2016. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ "Un Boeing 727 se estrella en México con 166 personas a bordo" [A Boeing 727 crashes in Mexico with 166 people on board]. El País (in Spanish). Spain: Newspaper library El País. 1 April 1986. Retrieved 28 October 2013.
- ^ a b c "The Crash of Mexicana de Aviacion Flight 940". ecperez.blogspot.co.nz. 29 September 2009. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ "Bodies recovered from mountain crash site". United Press International. 1986-04-02. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ Levi, Isaac A. (1986-04-04). "Mexican jet pilots claim plane crash caused by explosion". Kentucky New Era. Associated Press. Retrieved 2023-10-19.
- ^ a b "Mexican jet crash was revenge for U.S. attack on Libya: note". The Montreal Gazette. April 5, 1986. Retrieved 8 January 2018.
- ^ "AD 87-08-09". rgl.faa.gov. Archived from the original on 17 February 2022. Retrieved 1 August 2020.
- ^ Fields, Dana (May 23, 1986). "Explosion, fire preceded plane crash that killed 167". Nashua Telegraph. Associated Press. Retrieved 2023-10-19.
External links
- Planecrashinfo.com
- v
- t
- e
- 1949 Mexicana DC-3 crash (September 1949)
- Aeronaves de México Flight 111 (June 1958)
- Mexicana Flight 704 (June 1969)
- Mexicana de Aviación Flight 801 (September 1969)
- Aeroméxico Flight 229 (June 1973)
- Western Airlines Flight 2605 (October 1979)
- Aeroméxico Flight 230 (July 1981)
- Aeroméxico Flight 110 (November 1981)
- Mexicana Flight 940 (March 1986)
- TAESA Flight 725 (November 1999)
- Aerocaribe Flight 7831 (July 2000)
- November 2008 Mexico City Learjet crash (November 2008)
- Aeroméxico Flight 576 (September 2009)
- Aeroméxico Connect Flight 2431 (July 2018)