TACA Flight 390

TACA Flight 390 was a scheduled flight on May 30, 2008, by TACA Airlines from San Salvador, El Salvador, to Miami, Florida, United States, with intermediate stops at Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula in Honduras. The Airbus A320-233 overran the runway after landing at Tegucigalpa's Toncontín International Airport and rolled out into a street, crashing into an embankment and smashing several cars in the process.

Aircraft
The aircraft was an Airbus A320-233 (registration EI-TAF, c/n 1374). It was built in 2000 and entered service with TACA in 2001. The aircraft was leased twice to Cubana de Avación and Martinair in 2001 and 2007 respectively.

Crew
The flight crew included Salvadorans Captain Cesare Edoardo D'Antonio Mena (40) and First Officer Juan Rodolfo Artero Arevalo (26). All cabin crew members operating on the flight were Hondurans. Captain D'Antonio had 11,899 flight hours, including 8,514 hours on the Airbus A320, and first officer Artero had 1,607 hours with 250 of them on the Airbus A320. Both pilots had previously experience in landing at Toncontín International Airport; captain D'Antonio had landed at the airport 52 times, and first officer Artero had landed there 5 times.

Occupants
The passengers and crew members consisted of:

Accident
Flight 390 departed from San Salvador at 9:05 local time. At 09:40, the flight landed on runway 02 at Toncontín International Airport. Although both thrust reversers were deployed and the spoilers were activated, the aircraft overshot the runway at a speed of 54 knots (62 mph; 100 km/h), crossed an embankment, and crashed into a road beside the airport.

Investigation
Honduran authorities delegated the investigation of the accident to the Civil Aviation Authority of El Salvador as per the Convention on International Civil Aviation. The accident report stated that the airplane had landed with a 12-knot tailwind, 400 meters from the displaced approach end of the runway. Since this was the first intermediate stop on a long transcontinental flight, the aircraft was near its upper landing-weight limit (63.5t vs. 64.5t maximum allowable). In addition, the runway was wet, due to the passage of Tropical Storm Alma.

The Aviation Herald retrieved a copy of the final report in 2017. The report itself has not been made public. The Civil Aviation Authority concluded the cause of the accident was the flight crew's inappropriate decision to continue the landing despite not assessing the conditions of the runway, which did not follow standard operating procedures. The lack of grooving in the runway and the aircraft landing at a high speed of 160 knots (180 mph; 300 km/h) were also contributing factors.