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Atlas / NTSB / FTW90FA100

NTSB CAROL · Event

Event FTW90FA100

1990-04-25 UVALDE, Texas, United States Airport · UVA None 1 aircraft Status: Completed

Aircraft involved

Probable cause & findings

FAILURE OF THE PILOT TO OBTAIN A PRE-FLIGHT WEATHER BRIEFING, AND HIS IMPROPER IN-FLIGHT PLANNING/DECISION, WHICH RESULTED IN AN IN-FLIGHT ENCOUNTER WITH SEVERE WEATHER AND SUBSEQUENT ENGINE FLAMEOUTS. FACTORS RELATED TO THE ACCIDENT WERE: DARKNESS, THE SEVERE WEATHER CONDITIONS, AND ROUGH/UNEVEN TERRAIN IN THE FORCED LANDING AREA.

Factual narrative

THE FLT CREW ENCTRD SVR TURBC IN CRUISE FLT AT FL410, OVER A VIP LVL 4 TO 5 THUNDERSTORM. THE #2 ENG FLAMED OUT, THOUGH CONTINUOUS IGNITION HAD BEEN SELECTED. AFTER THE FLAME-OUT, THE ACFT STARTED TO DSCND & THE CREW BGN TO DIVERT TO A NRBY ARPT. DRG THE DSCNT, THE ACFT ENCTRD LARGE HAIL, HVY RAIN, SVR TURBC, LIGHTNING & ST ELMOS FIRE. THE OTR ENG FLAMED OUT AS THE ACFT WAS DSCNDG THRU FL330 (PRESUMABLY DUE TO HAIL & WATER INGESTION). ATTEMPTED AIR STARTS (BOTH WINDMILLING & STARTER ASSISTED) WERE UNSUCCESSFUL; INTERIOR LGTS BCM EXTREMELY DIM DRG STARTER ASSISTED ATMTS. SUBSEQUENTLY, THE ACFT WAS DMGD DRG A LNDG IN A WHEAT FLD. INV REVEALED THE CREW DID NOT RCV A WX BRIEFING BFR THE FLT. THERE WAS A CONVECTIVE SIGMET (6C) & AN ALERT WX WARNING (AWW 163), WHICH WERE ACTIVE FOR THE AREA. ACCORDING TO A WX STUDY, THERE WAS A SVR THUNDERSTORM, TOPPED AT OR NR FL410, MDT TO SVR UP/DWNDFTS, LARGE HAIL, HVY RAIN, STRONG WIND GUSTS, AND AIRFRAME ICING ABV 12,000' MSL. ALL FRONTAL AREAS OF THE ACFT RCVD MDT TO SVR HAIL DMG. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_1990_FTW90FA100.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Related research

What the literature says.

Academic papers and agency reports matching this event's aircraft type or causal vocabulary (icing, thunderstorm). Sourced from NASA NTRS, NTSB Safety Studies, FAA CAMI, AOPA Air Safety Institute, Embry-Riddle Scholarly Commons, arXiv, and the Semantic Scholar academic graph.

Browse the full corpus — academia portal ↗