By Scott Hamilton

Nov. 5, 2025, © Leeham News: Yesterday’s crash of a UPS Boeing (McDonnell Douglas) MD-11F evokes memories of American Airlines flight 191 in Chicago and the Air France Concorde crash in Paris.

The moment of impact of a UPS Boeing MD-11F freight that crashed on take-off from the Louisville (KY) airport. Credit: USA Today.

The UPS plane’s No. 1 engine apparently separated from the wing at around V1, the take-off speed, at the Louisville (KY) airport, where UPS’ main US hub is located. This is similar to the engine separation of the No. 1 engine of the American McDonnell Douglas DC-10 at a similar point on its take-off roll at O’Hare Airport. (This was the first aviation accident that I had as a reporter.)

American’s flight did not catch fire on take-off, but the slats on the left wing retracted after the engine damaged the hydraulic lines along the leading edge of the wing. There is a famous aviation picture of the DC-10, with its wings vertical to the ground, missing the engine, seconds before the plane crashed in a trailer park next to the airport. Valves were later added to the DC-10 to prevent such a retraction in the future.

The UPS MD-11, a derivative of the DC-10, did catch fire. So did the Air France Concorde, after running over a part that was on the runway at Charles de Gaulle Airport that fell off a preceding flight (ironically, a Continental Airlines DC-10). The Concorde’s tires threw the part into the wing fuel tank, which ignited. There is a famous picture of the Concorde, committed to take off, aloft on fire.

The UPS flight sequence, captured on multiple videos, is eerily similar to the American and Air France crashes. One video shows the MD-11 with its wings vertical to the ground, as the left wing sliced through a building seconds before impact.

Despite similarities, exercise caution in drawing conclusions.

How could it happen?

Even as fires raged, the Internet was alive with theories and questions about how and why the accident happened.

Given the lessons learned from the DC-10 crash, at least in theory, the slats shouldn’t retract, allowing the left wing to stall. Yet the flight’s characteristics look like what happened to the American aircraft.

A retired Boeing employee, whose duties during his career included safety, told LNA that a massive, catastrophic uncontained engine failure could have taken out the hydraulics and ignited fuel. This brings to mind the uncontained engine failure on the Qantas Airways Airbus A380 flight 32 after departure from Singapore. A major failure of the Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engine caused damage to hydraulic lines and ruptured the wing fuel tank. Fortunately, there was no fire despite the streaming fuel, and the flight crew safely landed the plane.

With the MD-11’s engine alongside the runway, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) will be able to determine pretty quickly if there was a massive structural or part failure of the GE Aerospace CF6 engine. While rare, such failures are not unknown. Think of the United Airlines DC-10 failure on flight 232 that crash landed at Sioux City (IA) or the American Airlines Boeing 767-300ER that was on its take-off roll at O’Hare. This take-off was successfully aborted. The resulting engine fire burned through the starboard wing. This aircraft remains remotely parked at O’Hare to this day. In the United and American 767 cases, a fan disk ruptured.

Don’t draw conclusions

Could any of these accidents have a bearing on the UPS flight? Maybe yes, maybe no. Don’t draw conclusions, even as the similarities are intriguing. As noted, the presence of the No. 1 engine along the runway will yield clues quickly for the NTSB. Recovery of the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder will be crucial to the investigation. However, the fires’ intensity could pose a problem if the damage to the recorders is severe.

There are reports, as yet unconfirmed, that the flight experienced a two-hour delay for maintenance on the No. 1 engine. Obviously, this will be an area of investigation by the NTSB.

As a matter of routine, so will the following, listed in no particular order of importance:

• Engine and aircraft maintenance history;
• Pilots’ history;
• Runway conditions and whether there may have been a ground collision with something that could have caused the engine to separate from the airplane;
• Weather and wind conditions;
• Why wasn’t the airplane able to get airborne, above the 150-175 feet tracked by Flight Aware? The MD-11 should have been able to continue the takeoff successfully on the two remaining engines.
• Was there an uncontained failure of the engine of such magnitude that the hydraulic lines were punctured and which ignited fuel?
• As a matter of routine, the FBI is an initial participant in an air crash investigation until a criminal action is ruled out.

The NTSB is prompt and thorough in its press briefings following an accident. Some answers should emerge fairly quickly. Boeing and GE will assist in the probe.