In the wake of the November 4 crash of a UPS MD-11 freighter in Louisville, the company announced it was temporarily grounding its MD-11 fleet “out of an abundance of caution.” The aircraft type, which makes up roughly 9 percent of UPS Airlines’ total fleet, will remain grounded pending additional inspections, the company said in its statement. The company said that it made the decision “proactively at the recommendation of the aircraft manufacturer“. FedEx has also joined UPS in grounding its MD-11 fleet.
The decision follows confirmation from the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) that the left engine of the 34-year-old aircraft separated from the wing during take-off, seconds before it crashed and caught fire beyond the runway. Investigators have recovered both the flight-data and cockpit-voice recorders, which show signs of heat damage but are expected to yield usable data.
While the cause remains under investigation, the incident has renewed scrutiny of the aging wide-body cargo aircraft that continue to shoulder much of the world’s freight demand. The MD-11, long retired from passenger service, is now central to the debate on how far legacy airframes can safely be stretched.
The aircraft’s long life and recent repair
According to aircraft data on AirFleets.net, the 34-year-old McDonnell Douglas MD-11F (serial 48417, registered N259UP) first entered service in 1991 as a passenger airliner for Thai Airways. Following nearly 15 years of passenger operation, it was converted into a freighter in 2006 and delivered to UPS later that year. With nearly 93,000 flight hours and over 21,000 cycles at the time of the accident, it was one of the oldest MD-11 in UPS’s active fleet.
Flight Radar data shows that the aircraft was on the ground from September 3 to October 18, suggesting the possibility that the aircraft underwent maintenance during that period.
FAA Service Difficulty Reports confirm that the aircraft underwent structural maintenance in September 2025. On September 4, technicians discovered a crack on the center-wing upper fuel-tank stringer, prompting a permanent repair under an engineering order. Five days later, a second report noted corrosion on a fuselage longeron in the center cargo-bilge area, which was subsequently treated and cleared by quality control.
While the FAA records do not indicate any link between these repairs and the crash, they confirm that structural issues in the center-wing and fuselage areas were identified and repaired weeks before the accident. Both repairs were formally logged and closed that month.
Such repairs are part of the challenge of keeping 30-plus-year-old jets airworthy. Cargo carriers rely on extensive heavy-maintenance checks and structural repairs that extend service lives far beyond what most passenger fleets now see.
The NTSB is expected to review these maintenance records as part of its broader investigation into the accident’s causes and contributing factors.
The MD-11: From Trijet Flagship to Cargo Workhorse
The MD-11 was developed by McDonnell Douglas as a longer-range, more capable successor to the DC-10, entering service in December 1990 with Finnair. Despite the ambitious aim, the aircraft failed to meet some of its fuel-burn and range goals for passenger operations and production ceased in 2000.
Many of the originally built passenger MD-11s were later converted into freighter specification and by the mid-2010s passenger service had ended worldwide. The last scheduled passenger flight was in October 2014 with KLM.
The MD-11 remains in commercial use only with three U.S. cargo operators and the average age of these aircraft is 30+ years:
- UPS Airlines – 26
- FedEx Express – 28
- Western Global Airlines – 4
Since its introduction, the McDonnell Douglas MD-11 has been involved in ten hull-loss accidents, including the recent crash of N259UP. Seven of these accidents resulted in fatalities, claiming close to 260 lives, with the deadliest being the 1998 Swissair Flight 111 disaster, in which 229 people were killed.
An earlier NTSB review found the MD-11 had a higher rate of hard-landing incidents than other wide-body types. Still, the model’s overall operational record reflects its transition from passenger to cargo duty, with most remaining airframes now exceeding 30 years in service and subject to intensive structural maintenance cycles.
The broader reckoning for aging freighters
For the industry, the crash underscores a mounting dilemma: Aging aircraft like the MD-11, DC-10, and early 767 freighters are being pushed harder and longer, their economics often outweighing their age. Yet with each high-profile accident, questions resurface about aircraft designed in a different era.
The NTSB’s findings may eventually determine whether the UPS disaster was a one-off structural failure or evidence of deeper maintenance vulnerabilities within legacy fleets. Until then, the haunting image of an engine shearing away from its wing will stand as a grim reminder of the risks inherent in extending the lives of aging freighters.
Related: UPS Cargo Jet Crashes After Takeoff in Louisville; Imagery Suggests Engine Separation
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