Alaska Airlines Aviation Accidents: NTSB Records, Investigations, and What Passengers and Families Should Know

What the NTSB Record Shows About Alaska Airlines Accidents

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is, in its own words, "an independent federal agency charged by Congress with investigating every civil aviation accident in the United States." Its investigations produce records at different stages, and the stage matters a great deal to anyone reading one.

A preliminary report is an early factual account: the date, the place, the aircraft and what investigators have gathered so far. The NTSB marks each page of one with the line "This information is preliminary and subject to change." It does not state a cause. A final report closes the investigation and contains the probable cause, the NTSB's own determination of what caused the accident.

Federal regulation describes the purpose of all this narrowly. Under 49 C.F.R. § 831.4, the NTSB investigates "to determine the facts, conditions, and circumstances relating to an accident," uses the results to determine probable causes and to issue safety recommendations, and its investigations "are not conducted for the purpose of determining the rights, liabilities, or blame of any person or entity."

The records on this page come from the NTSB aviation accident dataset and are identified by their NTSB accident numbers, each linked to the NTSB's own report. Under 49 U.S.C. § 1154(b), "No part of a report of the Board, related to an accident or an investigation of an accident, may be admitted into evidence or used in a civil action for damages resulting from a matter mentioned in the report."

For someone who was hurt, the report can explain what happened on a flight but cannot itself carry a civil claim. A reader looking at their own flight's record may want to note its accident number and whether it is preliminary or final, since that status shapes what the record can and cannot say.

What Kind of Carrier You Were Flying With and Why It Matters

Alaska Airlines appears in the NTSB's records as both the registered owner and the operator of the aircraft involved, listed as "ALASKA AIRLINES INC." The NTSB's final report for DCA21LA208 records its operating certificate as "Flag carrier (121)."

If you flew with Alaska Airlines, you were travelling with an air carrier, a company that carries passengers or cargo by air for hire. Each flight in these records ran under Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 121, the federal rules for air carrier operations. Most were "scheduled domestic passenger" flights; one was a "domestic cargo flight" operated under Part 121 on a non-scheduled basis.

Two federal agencies play different roles here. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issues the certificates aviation operators and crews hold; the NTSB's reports note that the NTSB serves "as the appellate authority for enforcement actions involving aviation and mariner certificates issued by the Federal Aviation Administration." The NTSB, by contrast, investigates accidents, determines probable causes and issues safety recommendations. The FAA also appears in these records as a party the NTSB invited to take part in investigations.

For a passenger or crew member, this matters in a concrete way: the operating rules that applied to your flight set the baseline for what care was owed, and whether you were a paying passenger, a flight attendant at work or crew on a cargo flight can shape which claims and which rules come into play. A useful next consideration is confirming the flight number, the type of flight and who operated it, since those details are often the starting point. This page describes the carrier only as the official records describe it and makes no statement about its practices.

Five Recent NTSB Accident Records Involving Alaska Airlines

The records below are the site's own selection from the NTSB dataset, newest first, with records located in one state left out of this national page. The number of records shown is the site's tally, not an NTSB statistic. Injury levels are as the NTSB dataset records them, not a legal determination of anyone's injuries.

DCA26LA106, January 28, 2026, Hebron, Kentucky, Airbus A330-343. Highest injury recorded: none. The NTSB's Aviation Investigation Preliminary Report - Accident Number: DCA26LA106 describes Alaska Airlines flight 2616, a Part 121 domestic cargo flight, which "struck birds during initial climb after takeoff," with "no injuries to the 2 crew on board." The report states, "The investigation is ongoing." The investigation is open and the NTSB has stated no probable cause.

DCA26LA102, January 15, 2026, Kodiak, Alaska, Boeing 737. Highest injury recorded: none. The Aviation Investigation Final Report - Accident Number: DCA26LA102 is a final report. The NTSB states the probable cause as "The reduced surface friction of the contaminated ramp which led to a loss of directional control during taxi."

DCA25FA071, December 26, 2024, Henderson, Nevada, Boeing 737. Highest injury recorded: serious. The NTSB's Aviation Investigation Preliminary Report - Accident Number: DCA25FA071 states that Alaska Airlines flight 700 "encountered severe turbulence during cruise flight," that "two flight attendants received serious injuries, and one received a minor injury," and that "The investigation is continuing." No probable cause has been stated.

DCA24MA063, January 5, 2024, Portland, Oregon, Boeing 737-9. Highest injury recorded: minor. In its Aviation Investigation Final Report - Accident Number: DCA24MA063, the NTSB describes "an in-flight separation of the left mid exit door plug and rapid depressurization during climb," with one flight attendant and seven passengers receiving minor injuries. The NTSB's stated probable cause is "the in-flight separation of the left mid exit door (MED) plug due to Boeing Commercial Airplanes' failure to provide adequate training, guidance, and oversight necessary to ensure that manufacturing personnel could consistently and correctly comply with its parts removal process." That is the NTSB's safety determination, not a finding of legal liability.

DCA21LA208, August 23, 2021, SeaTac, Washington, Boeing 737-990ER. Highest injury recorded: serious. The NTSB's Aviation Investigation Final Report - Accident Number: DCA21LA208 records an evacuation, with one serious injury, three minor injuries and 130 people uninjured. The NTSB states the probable cause as "The passenger's use of the evacuation slide resulted in the serious injury."

If you were aboard one of the two flights still open, the honest answer is that the government has not yet said why it happened. Because the investigation and any civil claim run separately, looking at one's options does not depend on a final report. Readers comparing carriers can see a similar records page for American Airlines accident records.

If the Investigation Is Still Open: What It Means for a Possible Claim

An investigation moves on its own schedule. Under 49 C.F.R. § 831.4, the NTSB begins by "monitoring the situation and assessing available facts," then notifies those it expects will be affected. An investigation may end in a report or other products, including "factual records, safety recommendations, and other safety information."

The NTSB also gathers evidence. Under 49 C.F.R. § 831.13, information collected in an investigation can include "photographs, visual representations of factual data, physical evidence from the scene of the accident, interview statements, wreckage documentation, flight data and cockpit voice recorder information, and surveillance video," and parties taking part must promptly give it to the NTSB unless the NTSB authorizes them to keep it. For someone who was hurt, this means much of the physical and recorded evidence from the flight sits with the NTSB and the investigation's parties, not with the passenger, which is one reason people's own records matter.

For someone weighing a claim, the practical effect of § 1154(b) is that waiting for a probable cause does not settle anything: a final finding does not decide a civil case, and an open investigation does not stop one. The NTSB's own reports add that "A factual report that may be admissible under 49 United States Code section 1154(b) is available," so the factual record and the NTSB's conclusions are treated differently. Section 1154 also limits discovery of cockpit recordings and unreleased transcripts, which a court may allow only under conditions the statute sets.

Families after an accident with a death have a separate federal provision. Under 49 U.S.C. § 1136, after an air carrier accident in U.S. airspace "resulting in any loss of life" where the NTSB leads the investigation, the NTSB Chairman designates a director of family support services and an independent nonprofit organization to coordinate emotional care, psychological care and family support services. None of the records above recorded a death. Section 1136(g)(2) also bars an attorney or potential party from making unsolicited communication about a potential injury or wrongful-death action to an injured person or relative "before the 45th day following the date of the accident," for accidents involving an air carrier providing interstate or foreign air transportation.

Limitation periods are a different matter. They differ from state to state and by legal theory, and when each period starts to run, and whether any exception applies, depends on the law that governs the claim. That is why people in this position often want to understand the applicable period early.

Which Type of Claim Might Fit What Happened on Your Flight

Federal aviation law and state law are separate layers. Federal rules, including Part 121, govern how air carriers operate. State law governs most civil claims for injury and death, and the rules on fault, damages and deadlines differ from state to state. The site's aviation accident lawyer overview explains these layers in more general terms. Which layer applies affects what a person who was hurt may be able to recover and by when.

Negligence asks whether someone responsible for your safety on the flight failed to take the care they owed and whether that failure caused your harm and losses. Being hurt on a flight does not by itself show anyone was careless; whether each part is met depends on the facts.

Product liability asks whether something on the aircraft, a component or a system, was defective and whether that defect caused the harm. An accident does not by itself prove a defect, and an NTSB finding about a part or a process is a safety determination, not proof in a civil case.

Wrongful death is the claim surviving family members may bring after a death caused by another's conduct. Who may bring it, what damages may be available and the deadline all differ by state; the site's page on aviation wrongful death claims covers them. The Death on the High Seas Act (DOHSA) is a federal law that can govern certain deaths occurring over the high seas, away from U.S. shores, and it can change which damages the law allows.

Damages are the losses the law may allow a person who was hurt to recover, such as medical expenses, lost income, pain and suffering; for a family, they include the categories wrongful-death law names. The stakes of choosing the right theory are real: the theory, the governing state and any federal law together decide who may be responsible, what may be recovered and by when. A natural next consideration is whether more than one theory fits the flight, which is one of the questions an attorney can help sort out.

What Passengers and Families Often Gather After an Aviation Accident

The NTSB builds its own record, separate from anything a passenger or family holds. Because the NTSB's report cannot be used in a civil damages case, the materials people keep for themselves often carry more weight in showing what happened to them.

The records that often matter include boarding passes and other travel documents, medical records from treatment after the accident, photographs or video taken on the aircraft or at the scene, and any incident reports. Injured people and families also commonly have the names and contact details of other passengers who saw what happened, and any letters, emails or messages from the airline.

For an injured flight attendant or crew member, work schedules and records of time missed often sit alongside the medical file. For a family, records about the person who was hurt or died, and about the household's losses, are part of the picture.

When an accident involves a death, § 1136(e) provides that the NTSB shall, to the maximum extent practicable, ensure families "are briefed, prior to any public briefing, about the accident, its causes, and any other findings," and are told of and allowed to attend public hearings and meetings. Section 1136(i) states that nothing in the section limits the assistance an air carrier may provide or the obligations it may have.

Sorting which of these records bear on the questions in a particular matter is one of the things a conversation can cover. If you would like to talk through the records from your flight, you can request a case evaluation.

Questions Worth Asking Before Deciding How to Proceed

People in this position often find themselves weighing:

Which legal theory fits what happened: negligence, product liability, wrongful death, or more than one.

Which state's law governs, given where the flight began, where it was headed, where the event occurred and where the people involved live.

Whether federal law, such as DOHSA, applies to the event.

What the limitation period is, and when it began to run.

Each answer turns on the specific facts of the flight and of the person's situation. This page can name the questions; it cannot answer them for one flight. A case evaluation is a conversation with our attorney about what happened. It is not a promise of representation or of any outcome.

This page is about aviation accidents specifically: airline, cargo, charter and other flight events and the investigations that follow them. It does not address injuries from other kinds of accidents.