Air Florida Flight 90
flight that crashed in 1982 near Washington (D.C.) National Airport
Air Florida Flight 90 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight operated from Washington National Airport (now Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport) to Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International Airport, with an intermediate stopover at Tampa International Airport, that crashed into the 14th Street Bridge over the Potomac River just after takeoff from Washington National Airport on January 13, 1982. The Boeing 737-200 that executed the flight, registered as N62AF, struck the bridge, which carries Interstate 395 between Washington, D.C., and Arlington County, Virginia, hitting seven occupied vehicles and destroying 97 feet (30 m) of guard rail before plunging through the ice into the Potomac River.
The aircraft was carrying 74 passengers and five crew members. Only four passengers and one crew member (flight attendant Kelly Duncan) were rescued from the crash and survived. Another passenger, Arland D. Williams Jr., assisted in the rescue of the survivors, but drowned before he could be rescued. Four motorists on the bridge were killed. The survivors were rescued from the icy river by civilians and professionals. President Ronald Reagan commended these acts during his State of the Union speech 13 days later.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined that the cause of the accident was pilot error. The pilots failed to switch on the engines' internal ice protection systems, used reverse thrust in a snowstorm prior to takeoff, tried to use the jet exhaust of a plane in front of them to melt their ice, and failed to abandon the takeoff even after detecting a power problem while taxiing and ice and snow buildup on the wings.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Air Florida Flight 90” as flight that crashed in 1982 near Washington (D.C.) National Airport. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the places & architecture register because the source frames it as flight that crashed in 1982 near Washington (D.C.) National Airport. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2372837. Authority coordinates are 38.874, -77.043. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1982.
Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
- Jurisdictional context
- Routes into maps and plans
Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Air Florida Flight 90”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Air Florida Flight 90 primary sources, Air Florida Flight 90 archive and Florida research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Air Florida Flight 90”?
- What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
- Which authority defined the place, boundary or structure at the relevant date?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Air Florida Flight 90” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.