Investigation Summary
Flight 80 was approaching Narita's runway 34L in challenging weather, with surface winds gusting up to 40 knots and reports of wind shear. The First Officer, acting as the pilot flying, initiated the landing flare late, at approximately 20 feet instead of the standard 30 feet. This resulted in a high sink rate and a hard first touchdown that caused the aircraft to bounce. In an attempt to correct the bounce, the pilot applied a large nose-down elevator input, which caused the aircraft to strike the runway nose-gear first (porpoising). A second, larger bounce followed. During the third and final touchdown, the aircraft impacted with a vertical acceleration of 3.06 G and a sink rate of 21.5 feet per second. The structural load transferred from the left main landing gear to the wing exceeded the ultimate design limit, causing the wing to fracture and fuel to ignite. The investigation highlighted that the MD-11's Longitudinal Stability Augmentation System (LSAS) and its small horizontal stabilizer made the aircraft particularly sensitive to pitch oscillations during landing. Furthermore, the crew's performance was likely degraded by fatigue; records indicated neither pilot had achieved more than four hours of consecutive sleep in the 24 hours preceding the accident. Notably, the First Officer primarily served as a relief pilot, which meant he performed landings infrequently and had limited experience handling the MD-11 during the critical landing phase.
Final Conclusions
The Japan Transport Safety Board (JTSB) concluded in its final report (AA2013-4, published April 26, 2013) that the primary cause was the development of porpoising oscillations due to large nose-down elevator inputs following a bounced landing. Contributing factors included the crew's failure to follow established bounce recovery procedures (which mandate holding a 7.5-degree pitch and using thrust), the high sink rate caused by a late flare in gusty winds, and significant crew fatigue. The JTSB specifically found that the autothrottle was unable to counteract the large wind velocity changes (decreasing headwind component) during the descent, which contributed to the development of the high sink rate. The report also noted that the landing gear fuse pins did not fail as intended because the impact forces were not aligned with the assumed failure modes during type certification.
Photographic Evidence (1)
Video Analysis
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Airframe & Maintenance
Crew Experience
Captain
Retired USMC fighter pilot.
First Officer
Former USAF C-5 Galaxy pilot; acting as Pilot Flying (PF) during the accident.
Systems & Failure Modes
LSAS (Longitudinal Stability Augmentation System)
A flight control system designed to improve the MD-11's pitch stability. The JTSB recommended improvements to LSAS to limit large nose-down inputs during touchdown.
AGS (Auto Ground Spoilers)
Systems that deploy spoilers upon touchdown to dump lift; investigators recommended reducing their deployment delay to prevent bounces.
Landing Gear Fuse Pins
Structural components designed to fail under specific loads to allow the gear to separate without rupturing fuel tanks; they did not fail in this case due to the horizontal component of the impact force.
Interesting Facts
- 01The aircraft was previously used by NASA as a test bed for the Propulsion-Controlled Aircraft (PCA) system.
- 02The kinetic energy at the third touchdown was estimated to be seven times the certification requirement.
- 03This was the first fatal accident at Narita International Airport since its opening.
- 04The accident bore striking similarities to the 1997 crash of FedEx Flight 14 at Newark.
- 05The MD-11 has a higher landing speed (154 knots) than most other airliners due to its small horizontal stabilizer.
Safety Actions & Advisories
MD-11 LSAS Enhancement
The JTSB recommended Boeing improve LSAS functions to limit large nose-down elevator inputs during touchdown and assist in bounce recovery.
Visual/Aural Touchdown Warnings
Recommendation to install systems that provide clear alerts to pilots regarding gear touchdown status to help judge the necessity of a go-around after a bounce.
AGS Logic Update
Recommendation to reduce the deployment delay of Auto Ground Spoilers to improve landing stability.