Skip to content

SEA85FA103

1985-05-03 · SEATTLE, Washington, United States · Fatal · 1 aircraft · Status: Completed

Airport BFI

Aircraft involved

Factual narrative

AFTER LIFTOFF, THE PLT REQUESTED AN IMMEDIATE RETURN FOR LANDING STATING HE, 'SMELLED SMOKE/SOMETHING HOT'. DOWNWIND FOR THE PRECAUTIONARY LANDING WAS FLOWN AT 200 FT AGL, A SLOW AIRSPEED AND CLOSE TO THE RUNWAY WITH A CROSSWIND BLOWING THE ACFT TOWARD THE RUNWAY. WITNESSES OBSERVED THE APCH TURN STEEPEN TO AN APRX 60 DEG ANGLE OF BANK WITH MINOR PITCH AND YAW EXCURSIONS (LOCAL PLTS REPORT THAT WIND FROM THE SOUTHWEST PRODUCES TURBULENCE AND WINDSHEAR DUE TO SURROUNDING STRUCTURES) BEFORE THE NOSE PITCHED UP ABRUPTLY AND THE ACFT FELL OFF ON THE RIGHT WING, ROLLING TO A NEAR-VERTICAL ATTITUDE AND IMPACTING THE RUNWAY. THE ACFT WAS IMMEDIATELY ENGULFED IN FIRE. FLAPS WERE FOUND IN THE UP POSITION. NO EVIDENCE FOUND OF PRE-IMPACT SOURCE OF SMOKE/HEAT AS REPORTED BY THE PLT. Source: NTSB Aviation Accident Database (Pre-2008 Archive) Retrieved: 2026-02-12

Verbatim from NTSB's published report. Source file NTSB_1985_SEA85FA103.txt. Findings + structured fields enriched from FAA avall.mdb. Full investigation docket on data.ntsb.gov ↗.

Search this event elsewhere

External sources are reported, not agency: signal that something happened, not fact about what happened.

Related research

Matched on aircraft type or causal vocabulary (turbulence). All research papers