United B739 at Denver on Jun 9th 2019, tail strike on landing
Last Update: February 24, 2022 / 21:34:27 GMT/Zulu time
Incident Facts
Date of incident
Jun 9, 2019
Classification
Accident
Cause
Tail strike on landing
Airline
United
Flight number
UA-401
Departure
Reno, United States
Destination
Denver, United States
Aircraft Registration
N75436
Aircraft Type
Boeing 737-900
ICAO Type Designator
B739
Airport ICAO Code
KDEN
A passenger reported the aircraft slammed into the runway twice, the pilots didn't make any announcements though.
A post flight inspection detected damage to the tail, the tail strike was then reported to tower.
The occurrence aircraft is still on the ground in Denver about 24 hours after landing.
On Feb 24th 2022 the NTSB released their final report concluding the probable cause of the accident was:
the early initiation of the landing flare that resulted in a high pitch attitude and tailstrike.
The NTSB summarized the sequence of events:
The first officer (FO) was the pilot flying and the captain was the pilot monitoring. During short final, the FO noticed he was about 5 knots fast, and about 50 feet above the runway, started to slowly reduce power and start the landing flare. At touchdown the airplane bounced. The FO was about to advance throttles for a go-around, when the captain took control and continued the landing after a second bounce. During the post flight walk around, the flight crew observed that the lower aft fuselage had sustained damaged due to a tailstrike.
Maintenance examination of the airplane found that the tailskid cartridge was compressed and there was substantial damage to the fuselage skin, frames, stringer clips and shear ties between fuselage station 827 to 907 and deformed stringers 27L and 27R.
Metars:
KDEN 092253Z 00000KT 10SM FEW055 FEW140 15/01 A3045 RMK AO2 SLP279 T01500011=
KDEN 092153Z VRB03KT 10SM FEW050 FEW140 16/02 A3046 RMK AO2 SLP279 T01610022=
KDEN 092053Z VRB03KT 10SM FEW050 FEW200 14/02 A3047 RMK AO2 SLP285 T01440022 58005=
KDEN 091953Z 00000KT 10SM SCT044 SCT085 SCT180 13/03 A3048 RMK AO2 SLP287 T01330028=
KDEN 091853Z 12007KT 10SM SCT042 BKN085 BKN200 13/03 A3048 RMK AO2 SLP292 T01280033=
KDEN 091753Z 07006KT 10SM SCT035 BKN080 BKN200 11/02 A3049 RMK AO2 SLP293 T01110022 10117 20072 51003=
KDEN 091653Z 05007KT 10SM SCT028 BKN075 11/03 A3049 RMK AO2 SLP286 T01060028=
KDEN 091553Z 03004KT 10SM SCT026 BKN060 09/03 A3048 RMK AO2 SLP286 T00940028=
Aircraft Registration Data
Incident Facts
Date of incident
Jun 9, 2019
Classification
Accident
Cause
Tail strike on landing
Airline
United
Flight number
UA-401
Departure
Reno, United States
Destination
Denver, United States
Aircraft Registration
N75436
Aircraft Type
Boeing 737-900
ICAO Type Designator
B739
Airport ICAO Code
KDEN
This article is published under license from Avherald.com. © of text by Avherald.com.
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