Ryan Air Services Flight 103

Ryan Air Services Flight 103

The wreckage of Flight 103
Accident
Date	23 November 1987 (1987-11-23)
Summary	Lost control on landing due to incorrect loading
Site	Near Homer Airport, Homer, Alaska, United States 59°38′21.5″N 151°29′49.3″W
Aircraft
A Beechcraft 1900C aircraft similar to the one involved in this accident
Aircraft type	Beechcraft 1900C
Operator	Ryan Air Services
IATA flight No.	7S103
ICAO flight No.	RYA103
Call sign	RYAN AIR 103
Registration	N401RA
Flight origin	Kodiak Airport, Kodiak, Alaska, United States
Destination	Homer Airport, Homer, Alaska, United States
Occupants	21
Passengers	19
Crew	2
Fatalities	18
Injuries	3
Survivors	3

On 23 November 1987, Ryan Air Services Flight 103, a Beechcraft 1900C operating a domestic flight in Alaska from Kodiak Airport to Homer Airport, crashed near the runway at Homer Airport, while approaching it. Out of the 21 passengers and crew on board, 18 were killed. It was determined that the cause of the crash was an improper loading, which led to a loss of control during landing.

Aircraft and crew

The aircraft involved was a Beechcraft 1900C, registered as N401RA, and manufactured in 1986. The captain was 26-year-old Robert Deliman Jr. He joined Ryan Air Services in 1984, he had logged a total of 7,087 flight hours, 4,420 of which were logged on the Beechcraft 1900. The first officer was 40-year-old Gareth Stoltzfus. He had been hired by Ryan Air Services in 1986. He had logged a total of 10,532 flight hours, 300 of which were logged on the Beechcraft 1900. There were 19 passengers on board, 17 from Alaska and 2 from Wisconsin, of them many were hunters returning from deer hunting in Kodiak Island.

Accident

Another angle of the wreckage of Flight 103

At 5:42 pm local time, the aircraft took off fully loaded, with 19 passengers on board and 651 kg of cargo, from runway 07 at Kodiak Airport. The aircraft had difficulties to become airborne, and had to accelerate to 15 knots over V1 speed to lift off from the runway. The cruise went uneventful. At 6:19 pm local time, Flight 103 was cleared to land following a DME approach, after a preceding plane cancelled an instrument approach. At 6:25 pm, the Homer Airport tower received a distress signal from the aircraft. Witnesses on the ground reported that Flight 103 was not in normal conditions during the approach. When the plane was about 24 meters from the runway, its wings rolled back and forth, and the aircraft started to fall steeply towards the ground. Flight 103 impacted terrain in a flat attitude, struck an airport perimeter fence, slid on its belly for a few meters, and then stopped. Initially of the 21 people on board, the captain and 13 passengers were killed, but the first officer and a passenger died while being transported to the hospitals, while two other passengers died the next day at Anchorage. In the end, three passengers survived. The cause of all the fatalities were the blunt forces of the impact.

Investigation

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators found out that the plane was over-loaded with 30 kg more than requested by the crew. The extension of the flaps while preparing for landing caused a loss of control, due to the fact that the center of gravity was displaced in a very aft position; icing conditions were present, but they did not caused the stall but only accelerated it. The final report stated that the cause of the crash was an improper loading, caused by the failure of the crew in supervising it, that caused a loss of control in a landing configuration. Recommendations made by the NTSB were all regarding the internal configuration of the aircraft, which contributed in great part to the fatalities.