New York – Cleveland – Chicago – Denver – Salt Lake City – San Francisco

On November 11, 1965 at 05:52 PM, New York – Cleveland – Chicago – Denver – Salt Lake City – San Francisco experienced a crash involving Boeing 727-100, operated by United Airlines, with the event recorded near Salt Lake City Utah.

The flight was categorized as scheduled revenue flight and the reported phase was landing (descent or approach) at a airport (less than 10 km from airport) crash site.

91 people were known to be on board, 43 fatalities were recorded, 48 survivors were identified or estimated. This corresponds to an estimated fatality rate of 47.3%.

Crew on board: 6, crew fatalities: 0, passengers on board: 85, passenger fatalities: 43, other fatalities: 0.

The listed crash cause is human factor. Flight 227 took off from New York-LaGuardia (LGA) for a flight to San Francisco (SFO) via Cleveland (CLE), Chicago (MDW), Denver (DEN) and Salt Lake City (SLC). The aircraft took off from Denver at 16:54 and climbed to its assigned cruising altitude of FL310. At 17:38 flight 227 began its descent for Salt Lake City. The flight proceeded in accordance with radar vectors. After a radar handoff to Salt Lake City Approach Control new clearance altitudes were given. At 17:47 the approach controller advised, "United seventy twenty seven ... five miles south of Riverton Fan Marker coming on localizer course cleared for ILS runway three four left approach." The pilot replied "Okay we're slowed to two fifty (Knots) and we're at ten (10,000 feet) we have the runway in sight now, we'll cancel and standby with you for traffic." Control of the flight was transferred to the tower and at 17:49:40 landing clearance was issued. The aircraft crossed the outer marker over 2,000 fee & above the ILS glide slope. The rate of descent during the final approach exceeded 2,000 ft/min, approximately three times the United Air Lines recommended rate of descent for landing approaches. The first officer attempted to apply power but the captain stopped him. Power was then applied too late to arrest the rate of descent. The airplane touched down 335 feet short of the threshold of runway 34L. The right and left main landing gear began to separate and the airplane slid onto the runway. Severe upward and rearward impact forces from the right main Landing gear assembly produced a large impact hole and ruptured fuel lines and the no. 3 generator leads between fuselage station 1030 and 1130 on the right side. The fuel was ignited by sparks from the fuselage scraping on the runway and/or the severed generator leads. 13 passengers were uninjured while 35 people were wounded. 43 other occupants were killed.

Aircraft reference details include registration N7030U, MSN 18322, year of manufacture 1965.

Geospatial coordinates for this crash are approximately 40.7596°, -111.8868°.