Corporate Airlines Flight 5966

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Corporate Airlines Flight 5966

Photograph of main wreckage area. The forward section of the airplane is in the foreground, and the tail section is in the background (the aft pressure bulkhead is indicated by the red arrow)
Accident
Date	October 19, 2004 (2004-10-19)
Summary	Controlled flight into terrain due to pilot error[1]
Site	Adair County, near Kirksville Regional Airport, Kirksville, Missouri, United States 40°03′53″N 92°32′35″W / 40.064618°N 92.543186°W / 40.064618; -92.543186Coordinates: 40°03′53″N 92°32′35″W / 40.064618°N 92.543186°W / 40.064618; -92.543186
Aircraft
Aircraft type	British Aerospace Jetstream 32
Operator	Corporate Airlines d/b/a AmericanConnection
Registration	N875JX[2]
Flight origin	St. Louis Lambert International Airport
Destination	Kirksville Regional Airport
Occupants	15
Passengers	13
Crew	2
Fatalities	13
Injuries	2 (serious)
Survivors	2

Corporate Airlines Flight 5966 was a scheduled passenger flight from St. Louis, Missouri to Kirksville, Missouri. On October 19, 2004, the Jetstream 32 operating the flight crashed on approach to Kirksville Regional Airport due to pilot error. Thirteen people were killed.

Flight information[]

A Jetstream 32EP similar to the accident aircraft

Flight 5966 was a flight route from St. Louis Lambert International Airport in St. Louis, Missouri, United States to Kirksville Regional Airport in unincorporated Adair County, Missouri, near the city of Kirksville. Corporate Airlines (later RegionsAir, now defunct) flew the route as part of the AmericanConnection network, an affiliate of American Airlines.^[3]

The captain was 48-year-old Kim William Sasse, a former flight instructor who had been with Corporate Airlines since 2001. He had logged 4,234 flight hours, including 2,510 hours on the Jetstream 32.^{[1]: 8–10 [4]} The first officer was 29-year-old Jonathan Palmer, also a former flight instructor. Palmer had been hired by Corporate Airlines only three months before the accident and had 2,856 flight hours, though only 107 of them were on the Jetstream 32.^{[1]: 10–12 [5]}

Accident[]

On October 19, 2004, the Jetstream 32 twin-engine turboprop flying the route crashed on the approach to Kirksville Airport. The crash killed both pilots and 11 of the 13 passengers aboard. The two surviving passengers were seriously injured.^{[1]: 5, 15 [6]}

Some of the 13 passengers were doctors from other states who had been due to attend a seminar at the A. T. Still University. These included Steven Z. Miller, who was killed in the crash. Dr. Miller was director of pediatric emergency medicine at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, a prominent figure in "humanism in medicine" movement.^[7][8]

Investigation[]

Seating map of Corporate Airlines Flight 5966 produced by the NTSB.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined that the probable cause of the accident was:

"the pilots' failure to follow established procedures and properly conduct a non-precision instrument approach at night in instrument meteorological conditions, including their descent below the minimum descent altitude before required visual cues were available (which continued un-moderated until the airplane struck the trees) and their failure to adhere to the established division of duties between the flying and non-flying (monitoring) pilot."

The NTSB analysis of the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) suggests that both pilots were looking outside the cockpit for visual cues to the location of the airport and failed to realize how low they had descended below the minimum descent altitude. The report further states:

Contributing to the accident were the pilots' failure to make standard callouts and the current Federal Aviation Regulations that allow pilots to descend below the minimum descent altitude into a region in which safe obstacle clearance is not assured based upon seeing only the airport approach lights. The pilots' failure to establish and maintain a professional demeanor during the flight and their fatigue likely contributed to their degraded performance.^[1]

In popular culture[]

The television series Aircrash Confidential featured the incident in the third episode of Season 2, titled Pilot Fatigue.^[9]

See also[]

• American Airlines Flight 965
• American Airlines Flight 1420
• Korean Air Flight 801
• UPS Flight 1354

References[]

 This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the National Transportation Safety Board.

External links[]

• NTSB Preliminary Report from NTSB Aviation Accident Database
• NTSB Final Report
• Archived American Airlines page about Corporate 5966
• Link to archived press statements by Corporate Airlines
• "'I didn't believe it was happening'," Deseret News