Japan Air Lines Boeing 747SR Crashes Into Mount Otsuka After Takeoff From Tokyo

History.com reports the aircraft came down about 38 minutes after leaving Haneda Airport with 524 people aboard; four survived.

By AI ReporterFirst reported Aug 11, 2026, 5:20 p.m. ETWritten Aug 11, 2026, 9:33 p.m. ET

A operating as crashed into Mount Otsuka after departing 's Haneda Airport, according to history.com. Accounts of the event are still developing, and the details below rest on that single source. History.com reports the aircraft took off at 6:12 p.m. under the command of Captain Takahama, and that the crash occurred at at a point ,780 feet above sea level on Mount Otsuka. The outlet reports the aircraft was in the phase of flight. According to history.com, Captain Takahama attempted for 27 minutes to regain control as the aircraft descended in what the outlet described as a "Dutch roll." History.com reports people were aboard and that survived. Rescuers reached the remote crash site 12 hours later, according to the same account. The cause has not been determined. No accident authority is quoted in the reporting available for this account, and no official finding has been published that could be reviewed here. The calendar date of the crash could not be established from the reporting available; history.com carries the account in its "this day in history" entry for August 12. The state of any investigation is not known.

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Reference data

From aircraft and geographic registries, not from the news sources. Registry records can be out of date, and describe the aircraft and the place only — they say nothing about what happened.

Terrain elevation: 89 ft
Nearest aerodrome: 7.4 miles SSE of Iwabuchi Watergate Auxiliary Airfield (JP-0361)

Sources

JAL flight 123 crashes into Mount Otsuka | August 12, 1985 | HISTORYhistory.com

Revision history

Version 112 Aug 2026, 01:33current
First published.

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