March 23 (Bloomberg) -- FedEx Corp., the world’s largest cargo airline, suffered its first fatal accident with the crash of a Boeing Co. MD-11 jet at Tokyo’s Narita airport that killed both pilots.

Flight 80 from Guangzhou, China, was trying to land today when the incident occurred amid strong winds at 6:49 a.m. local time, Japan’s transport ministry said. FedEx identified the captain as Kevin Kyle Mosley, 54, of Hillsboro, Oregon, and the first officer as Anthony Stephen Pino, 49, of San Antonio.

FedEx hadn’t previously suffered deaths involving its own employees or one of its own planes since the Memphis, Tennessee- based company’s airline unit was created 37 years ago, spokesman Maury Lane said in a telephone interview. Contractors flying for FedEx have been involved in fatal crashes.

“It can get very gusty at Narita because it’s near the water, and the winds can change rapidly,” said Vaughn Cordle, a retired pilot who flew Boeing 777s into the airport for more than a decade and now runs consulting firm AirlineForecasts LLC in Clifton, Virginia. “There could have been a sudden wind burst or a downdraft.”

Winds at the time were from the northwest at 33 miles per hour (53 kilometers per hour), according to the U.S. National Weather Service.

TV Images

Images on Japan’s NTV news channel showed the MD-11 catapulting to the left and bursting into flames before it broke apart. Dozens of firefighters sprayed charred portions of the jet, which came to rest with its landing gear pointing toward the sky.

“Right now our focus is on doing everything we can to assist the family and those affected at this difficult time,” Chief Executive Officer Fred Smith, FedEx’s founder, said in a statement. “This loss pains all of us.”

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said it sent a team of investigators to assist Japanese officials. Also en route were representatives of the Federal Aviation Administration, Boeing and the Air Line Pilots Association, the union that represents FedEx’s 4,400 pilots.

Mosley had worked for FedEx since 1996, with 12,800 total career flight hours, the company said. Pino joined FedEx in 2006 and had 6,300 career flight hours.

FedEx hasn’t said how much of the cargo on the Tokyo flight can be recovered.

Narita Disruptions

Today’s crash forced Japan Airlines Corp. and All Nippon Airways Co., the nation’s largest carriers, to cancel a total of 38 flights after the Tokyo airport closed the longer of its two runways. Planes were still operating on the second landing strip, according to airport spokesman Masaru Fujisaki.

It was the first fatal accident at Narita, Japan’s busiest international airport.

FedEx, the second-largest U.S. package-shipper behind United Parcel Service Inc., had 58 MD-11s as of November, according to its Web site. The company had about 580 planes in its main fleet and leases 96 more, according to its most recent annual report.

The leased aircraft are typically flown by contractors who ferry packages from smaller cities into FedEx’s sorting hubs. FedEx contractors have been involved in fatal accidents before, including a leased Cessna 208 turboprop plane that crashed in 2005 near Winnipeg, Manitoba, killing the pilot.

The MD-11 model was produced by Boeing’s McDonnell Douglas division between 1990 and 2001 when the model was discontinued, according to the Chicago-based planemaker’s Web site. Boeing acquired McDonnell Douglas Corp. in 1997.

U.S. air carriers are flying 107 MD-11s, with cargo- carrying versions accounting for 102 of those aircraft, according to the Ascend Online Fleets database.

To contact the reporters on this story: Mary Jane Credeur in Atlanta at mcredeur@bloomberg.net; Chris Cooper in Tokyo at ccooper1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: March 23, 2009 16:12 EDT