In honor and memory of lost loved ones:

Air Midwest Airlines Flight 5481

(operating as USAirways Express Flight 5481)

January 8 , 2003

Charlotte, NC - Greenville-Spartanburg, SC

Crashed on climbout, Charlotte, NC

Beechcraft 1900D Turboprop

The following is a list of known passengers aboard this flight. Crewmembers are separated by position, then alphabetically. Passengers are listed alphabetically by last name. This list has been compiled using all available news sources, including news reports, FAA and NTSB reports, and airline press releases.

This list may or may not be complete and is subject to errors

and should not be taken as an official source of information.

If you wish to have a name added or removed from this list, or if information listed is incorrect please contact the webmaster, with "Add/Remove/Correct Memorial List" in the subject line, along with the passenger name, flight, and request or change.

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Probable Cause: Unknown (Under Investigation)

Abstract: 

On January 8, 2003, about 0847:28 eastern standard time, Air Midwest (doing business as US Airways Express) flight 5481, a Raytheon (Beechcraft) 1900D, N233YV, crashed shortly after takeoff from runway 18R at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport, Charlotte, North Carolina. The 2 flight crewmembers and 19 passengers aboard the airplane were killed, 1 person on the ground received minor injuries, and the airplane was destroyed by impact forces and a postcrash fire. Flight 5481 was a regularly scheduled passenger flight to Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport, Greer, South Carolina, and was operating under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 121 on an instrument flight rules flight plan. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed at the time of the accident.

The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause(s) of this accident as follows:

the airplane's loss of pitch control during take-off. The loss of pitch control resulted from the incorrect rigging of the elevator system compounded by the airplane's aft center of gravity, which was substaintially aft of the certified aft limit.

Contributing to the cause of the accident were (1) Air Midwest's lack of oversight of the work being performed at the Huntington, West Virginia, maintenance station; (2) Air Midwest's maintenance procedures and documentation; (3) Air Midwest's weight and balance program at the time of the accident; (4) the Raytehon Aerospace quality assurance inspector's failure to detect the incorrect rigging of the elevator control system; (5) the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) average weight assumptions in its weight and balance program guidance at the time of the accident; and (6) the FAA's lack of oversight of Air Midwest's maintenance program and its weight and balance program.

Fatalities: 21    Surviors: 0

Crewmembers: 

Passengers: