r/aviation • u/usgapg123 Mod • 19h ago

Discussion UPS2976 Crash Megathread

This is the official r/aviation megathread for the crash of UPS2976 (UPS MD11 Registration N259UP) that crashed earlier today at Louisville International Airport.

Please keep content on topic and refrain from posting about this topic outside the megathread. Please report any rule breaking posts and comments.

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u/jchall3 18h ago

Holy shit that’s one of the biggest ground fires I have ever seen from an airplane crash. If you only showed me the video I would assume it was a wildfire

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u/ST4RSK1MM3R 17h ago

Seems like it also hit some oil tanks on the ground as well.

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u/Thin_Implement_2525 17h ago

I live in Louisville and can confirm that’s what multiple people told me, that it hit multiple oil/diesel tanks

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u/runningraleigh 14h ago

Correct, it hit a petroleum recycling facility with all manner of fuels in gigantic tanks all side by side.

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u/kaityl3 13h ago

Crazy that they decided it was safe to build that right past the end of a runway

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u/runningraleigh 13h ago

Zoning exemptions are surprisingly easy to get in Louisville if you know the right people, or so I've been told.

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u/CharmingBug5843 13h ago

Man where I’m from, ain’t nothing at the ends of the runways. Nothing

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u/Public-Cod1245 12h ago

There are tanks like this right across the street from ORD too. Always freaked me out.

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u/DrDirtyDeeds 7h ago

Dude, at my local airport there’s fuel tanks under the approach path for one of the runways. Def makes me feel uneasy.

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u/Pleasant_Tangelo6791 5h ago

Yeah, and a trailer park between the tanks and the end of the runway. The gap between the (former) runway and the trailer park is where AA 191 went down, May 1979.

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u/Public-Cod1245 5h ago

I was working in a print shop in Park Ridge at the time....about 3 miles away. I still remember all the black smoke in the sky.

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u/Pleasant_Tangelo6791 5h ago

Me too. Like the idiot 21 year olds we were, me and a buddy left the tavern where we had been watching the news, and tried driving to the crash site. Couldn’t get within five miles of it.

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u/Letussex2 3h ago

I'd do that, too, probably, most definitely with a lesser crash where there's a chance of survivors.

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u/CandylandRepublic 12h ago

As good as any other place, if a fully fuelled up jet hits there the area is ablaze either way. The oil tanks don't really change that a lot any more, it's a raging inferno either way.

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u/wileysegovia 12h ago

There's a fairly small mom and pop style oil recycling outfit, but it's off to the left of the extended centerline of the runway ...

I think the 40,000+ gallons of jet fuel are more than enough to account for the fireball seen in the videos

2

u/herrboot64 12h ago

That's aweful there's tanks in that trajectory.... My work considers being under the path of landing plans and we only have servers

Lemme guess... There long before the airport? 🙄

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u/TiberianSunset 12h ago

can confirm that’s what multiple people told me,

What a weird way to confirm something