United Airlines Flight 232

United Airlines Flight 232 was a regularly scheduled United Airlines flight from Denver to Chicago, continuing to Philadelphia. On July 19, 1989, the DC-10 serving the flight crash-landed at Sioux City, Iowa, after suffering a catastrophic failure of its tail-mounted engine, which led to the loss of many flight controls. At the time, the aircraft was en route from Stapleton International Airport to O'Hare International Airport. Of the 296 passengers and crew on board, 112 died during the accident, while 184 people survived. The crash was the fifth-deadliest one involving the DC-10, behind Turkish Airlines Flight 981, American Airlines Flight 191, Air New Zealand Flight 901, and UTA Flight 772. Despite the deaths, the accident is considered a prime example of successful crew resource management because of the large number of survivors and the manner in which the flight crew handled the emergency and landed the airplane without conventional control.

The airplane, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-10 , was delivered in 1971 and owned by United Airlines since then. Before departure on the flight from Denver on July 19, 1989, the airplane had been operated for a total of 43,401 hours and 16,997 cycles . The airplane was powered by CF6-6D high-bypass-ratio turbofan engines produced by General Electric Aircraft Engines . The aircraft's No. 2 engine had accumulated 42,436 hours and 16,899 cycles of operating time immediately prior to the accident flight.

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