On December 20, 1995, the Boeing 757-200 flying this route (registration N651AA[1]) crashed into a mountain in Buga, Colombia, around 9:40 pm killing 151 of the 155 passengers and all eight crew members.

[7] The Colombian Special Administrative Unit of Civil Aeronautics investigated the accident and determined it was caused by navigational errors by the flight crew.

[citation needed] The cockpit crew consisted of Captain Nicholas Tafuri (57), and First Officer Donald "Don" Williams (39).

[8]: 5 Captain Tafuri had flown with the United States Air Force from 1963 to 1969 and served in the Vietnam War, and joined American Airlines in 1969.

The airplane's flight management system (FMS) navigation computer already had these beacons programmed in, and should have, in theory, told the pilots exactly where to turn, climb, and descend, all the way from Miami to the terminal in Cali.

By selecting "R" from the waypoint list, the captain caused the autopilot to start flying a course to Bogotá, resulting in the airplane turning east in a wide semicircle.

[15] The air traffic controller, Nelson Rivera Ramírez, believed that some of the requests of the pilots did not make sense, but did not know enough non-aviation English to convey this.

[16] Twelve seconds before the plane hit the mountain, named El Diluvio (the Deluge),[17] the ground proximity warning system (GPWS) activated, announcing an imminent terrain collision and sounding an alarm.

When take-off power was selected, neither pilot had remembered to disengage the previously deployed speed brakes, which were fully extended and significantly reduced the rate of climb.

[21] The crash was investigated by the Special Administrative Unit of Civil Aeronautics (Spanish: Aeronáutica Civil) of the Republic of Colombia,[8] with assistance from the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), as well as other parties, including the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, Allied Pilots Association, American Airlines, Boeing Commercial Airplane Group, and Rolls-Royce Engines.

Because the 757 flight simulators could not be backdriven during the tests, whether the airplane would have missed the mountain/tree tops if the speedbrakes had been retracted during the climb attempt could not be determined with precision,[8] but the final report stated that if the flightcrew had retracted the speedbrakes one second after initiating the escape maneuver, the airplane could have been climbing through a position that was 46 m (150 ft) above the initial impact point.

American Airlines filed a "third-party complaint" lawsuit for contribution against Jeppesen and Honeywell, which made the navigation computer database and failed to include the coordinates of Rozo under the identifier "R"; the case went to trial in United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida in Miami.

[27][28][29] All U.S. registered turbine-powered aircraft capable of carrying more than six passengers built since 2002 are required to have an advanced terrain awareness warning system.