Leeham News and Analysis
There's more to real news than a news release.
There's more to real news than a news release.
NTSB issues preliminary report of UPS crash with dramatic moment engine leaves airplane
Nov. 20, 2025, (c) Leeham News: The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) released its preliminary report of the UPS Boeing MD-11F accident of Nov. 4 in Louisville (KY). Included are photos of the dramatic moment the No. 1 engine separated from the airplane, which had just lifted off on take-off.
The report may be downloaded here: Prelimiary Report DCA26MA024 UPS MD11
Wow, those are incredible photos. Such an unfortunate accident.
Hardware or MRO failure.
The 45 secs must have been harrowing for the crew.
Given the Boeing advisory to ground, slight probability they felt hardware failed. But not more than slight.
Interesting- 92922 hours and 21043 cycles showas the average cycle time of 4.4 hours per cycle. I’m sure the normal passenger flight cycle time is longer. A shorter cycle time IMHO means more full thrust takeoffs per flight hour. It would ” seem ” that some sort of slack in the forward and aft lugs ( fig 9 ) resulted in basic fatigue failure of the aft lug. I’m sure a detailed analysis will pin down the sequence and probable reason.
Interesting that so far only LEFT wing failures have been documented for that basic model.