Blue Grass Airport - Incidents and Accidents

Incidents and Accidents

• December 5, 1987: After suffering an in-flight engine fire en route from Dallas, Texas to New York, the flight crew of a Hawker Siddeley HS.125 business jet, registration number N400PH, touched down short of the runway while attempting an emergency landing at Blue Grass Airport. The jet crossed a highway and struck an automobile, utility poles, and 2 fences, killing the pilot and co-pilot, and injuring both passengers in the aircraft and 2 people in the automobile. The accident was attributed to the crew's inadvertent retraction of the aircraft's flaps, causing the jet to suddenly lose altitude.

• November 1993: The flight crew of an unidentified commercial jet at Blue Grass Airport was cleared for takeoff on Runway 22 but mistakenly lined up at the shorter Runway 26 instead. Tower personnel noticed the mistake and cancelled the aircraft's takeoff clearance just as the crew realized their error. The aircraft subsequently made a safe departure from Runway 22.

• August 30, 2002: A Learjet 35C, registration number N45CP, overran Runway 4 on landing, killing 1 passenger and seriously injuring 4 other occupants of the aircraft. The accident was attributed to the pilot's application of additional forward thrust after failing to properly deploy the jet's thrust reversers.

• August 27, 2006: Comair Flight 5191, a Bombardier CRJ-100ER operated by regional carrier Comair on behalf of Delta Connection, overran Runway 26 and crashed after being cleared to take off from the much longer Runway 22. There were 49 fatalities, with the first officer, James Polehinke, being the only survivor.

• March 25, 2009: A Cessna 182, registration number N4871N, crashed 3 mi (5 km) west of Blue Grass Airport, killing the pilot and sole occupant. The pilot apparently became disoriented during the landing approach after losing electrical power in densely clouded IFR conditions, but the cause of the crash had not been positively determined as of September 2009.