Overseas National Airways Flight 032

About

Overseas National Airways Flight 032 was a non-scheduled positioning flight operated by Overseas National Airways with a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30CF. On November 12, 1975, the flight crew initiated a rejected takeoff after accelerating through a large flock of gulls at John F. Kennedy International Airport, resulting in a runway excursion. Of the 139 aircraft occupants, all survived, while the aircraft was destroyed by an intense post-crash fire. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) concluded that the probable cause of the accident was bird ingestion into the right-hand engine, causing an uncontained engine failure that ruptured several landing gear tires and disabled the engine's hydraulic system, in turn partially disabling the spoilers and the landing gear brakes. Contributing to the accident was the resultant failure of the affected engine's thrust reverser and the wet runway. General Electric Aircraft Engines, makers of the DC-10's CF6 engines, partially dissented from the NTSB's conclusions, stating that the engine failure was caused by ingestion of debris from a main landing gear wheel and tire failure prior to the collision with the gulls. The accident aircraft is claimed to be the largest commercial airliner ever destroyed due to a bird strike.