Description

On 12 February 2009, a Bombardier DHC-8-400 which was being operated by Colgan Air on a scheduled domestic passenger from Newark to Buffalo-Niagara under a Continental Airlines flight number as part of a codeshare agreement in place between the two operators was on an ILS approach to the destination runway in night VMC when control was lost and the aircraft crashed and burned in a residential area approximately 5 nm from the runway killing all occupants and one additional person on the ground.

The Investigation

The Investigation was carried out by the National Transportation Safety Board (USA) (NTSB). It established that 47 year-old Captain, who had been PF for the accident flight had a total of 3,379 flying hours of which just 111 hours had been on type. He had been employed by Colgan for a little over 3 years. The 24 year-old First Officer had a total of 2,240 flying hours which included 774 hours on type, the latter all achieved after she had joined Colgan about a year prior to the accident.

It was found that the aircraft had been fully serviceable and not subject to any significant effects` attributable to ice accretion at the time of the accident. However, reference airspeeds set by the flight crew for the approach were not compatible with the position of the “reference speeds switch” which was in the “increase” (icing conditions) position which would therefore automatically trigger a stall warning in the form of a stick shaker activation at a higher airspeed.