Has a commercial flight ever crashed in San Diego?
Video above: The CEO of the San Diego Air & Space Museum discusses the recent American Airlines crash with KUSI.
SAN DIEGO (FOX 5/KUSI) — An Army helicopter collided with an American Airlines jet as it was landing at an airport near Washington, D.C. Wednesday night and all 64 people aboard the commercial airliner were killed. Some are left wondering, has anything like this ever happened in San Diego?
The short answer is 'yes.'
This tragic incident may be triggering past traumas for some San Diegans who lost loved ones during a similar incident that occurred in North Park on the fateful day of Sept. 25, 1978. Just like the recent crash, a Pacific Southwest Airlines plane, known as PSA Flight 182, collided midair with a Cessna aircraft, according to an accident report filed by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
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Fragments of that commercial flight, soaring in the sky nearly five decades ago, rained down from San Diego's airspace, with the plane ultimately crashing to the ground in North Park. The routine route between Sacramento and San Diego turned tragic, with a total of 144 people, including bystanders on the ground below, losing their lives due to the midair collision.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined that the probable cause of the 1978 accident was 'the failure of the flight crew of PSA Flight 182 to comply with the provisions of a maintain-visual separation clearance, including the requirement to inform the controller when they no longer had the other aircraft in sight.'
Also contributing to the accident were particular air traffic control procedures. As explained by NTSB, they 'authorized the controllers to use visual separation procedures to separate two aircraft on potentially conflicting tracks when the capability was available to provide either lateral or vertical radar separation to either aircraft.'
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As a result of commercial airliner going down in San Diego, NTSB recommended that the FFA do the following:
Implement a Terminal Radar Service Area TRSA at the then-Lindbergh Airport.
Review procedures at all airports which are used regularly by air carrier and general aviation aircraft to determine which other areas require either a terminal control area or a terminal control radar service area and establish an appropriate one.
Use visual separation in terminal control areas and terminal radar service areas only when a pilot requests it, except for sequencing on the final approach with radar monitoring.
Re-evaluate its policy with regard to the use of visual separation in other terminal areas.
A cemented memorial honoring the victims of the PSA Flight 182 crash was installed in North Park just last year, creating a space where loved ones can gather to honor those lost in the incident. It's located at the intersection of Dwight and Nile streets, where the crash occurred.
The cause of the recent collision between an American Airlines jet and Army helicopter remains under investigation.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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