South Korea plane crash: investigations into cause of Jeju Air ...

South Korea’s acting president has ordered an emergency safety inspection of the country’s entire airline operations, while authorities plan a separate check of all Boeing 737-800s, after 179 people died in a Jeju Air crash involving the aircraft on Sunday.

As shocked citizens began a second day of official mourning and flags flew at half-mast, the government said it would carry out the audit of all 101 of the aircraft in domestic operation, with US investigators, possibly including Boeing, joining the probe.

Choi Sang-mok, who was appointed president two days before the disaster, said an exhaustive inspection was essential to overhaul the aviation safety system and “move toward a safer Republic of Korea”.

He was speaking as reports emerged that a passenger jet belonging to Jeju Air was forced to return to Gimpo airport in Seoul soon after taking off on Monday, following an unspecified problem with its landing gear.

Landing gear malfunction is among the issues being targeted by the investigation into Sunday’s crash, which occurred after the plane skidded along the runway in what the aviation industry describes as a “belly landing”.

Officials have confirmed that 179 of the 181 passengers and crew died when the Jeju Air plane crashed into a wall at Muan international airport shortly after attempting to land without its landing gear deployed. It is the country’s worst domestic civil aviation disaster.

• South Korea’s acting president Choi Sang-mok has ordered an emergency safety inspection of the country’s entire airline operation system, while Seoul was also reviewing plans to conduct a “special inspection” of all Boeing 737-800s in operation in the country, following Sunday’s crash, the country’s worst domestic civil aviation disaster.

• South Korea has begun seven days of national mourning, with flags flown at half-mast and acting President Choi flying to the crash site in southwestern Muan for a memorial.

• 141 of the 179 victims have now been identified using DNA analysis or fingerprint collection. Victims’ families camped out at the airport overnight in special tents set up in the airport lounge.

• Teams of investigators, including from the US and South Korea, are now trying to establish what caused Sunday’s disaster. Officials initially cited a bird strike as a likely cause of the crash, though questions remain over exactly what happened. Both black boxes – the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder – have been found.

• Another Jeju Airlines flight using a B737-800 aircraft experienced a malfunction linked to the landing gear and was forced to return to Seoul’s Gimpo airport shortly after takeoff, Yonhap News Agency reported. A Jeju Air representative said they were “aware of the return incident” and “looking into the cause.”

• Experts who have reviewed footage of the disaster – showing the plane making an emergency landing but then hitting a wall – have also raised questions over the airport’s design, criticising a decision to build a wall, a solid structure, at the end of the airfield.

• Messages of condolence continued to flow from across the world. US President Joe Biden said the United States was ready to offer “any necessary assistance”, while Chinese president Xi Jinping, and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen expressed sympathy. Pope Francis, told worshippers at the Vatican that he joined “in prayer for the survivors and the dead”.

South Korea’s ministry of land has said 141 of the 179 victims have now been identified using DNA analysis or fingerprint collection.

South Korea has started seven days of national mourning, with acting president Choi Sang-mok flying to the crash site in southwestern Muan for a memorial. Flags flew at half-mast on Monday and memorial altars are to be set up nationwide.

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The cause of Sunday’s crash is still unclear. Officials have pointed to a bird strike as a likely reason for the tragedy. A warning of a bird strike was issued by the control tower minutes before the crash.

However, experts who have reviewed footage of the disaster – showing the plane making an emergency landing but then hitting a wall – have questioned whether airport construction could have played a part.

AFP has spoken to Kim Kwang-il, Professor of Aeronautical Science at Silla University and a former pilot, who said there shouldn’t have “a solid structure” in that area at all.

“Normally, at the end of a runway, there’s no such solid obstruction - it’s against international aviation safety standards,” he said.

“The structure in question caused the aircraft to crash and catch fire.

“Outside the airport, there are usually just fences, which are soft and wouldn’t cause significant damage. The plane could have skidded further and stopped naturally. The unnecessary structure is highly regrettable.”

Reuters has spoken to Jeon Je-young, 71, whose daughter Mi-sook was among the 179 people killed in Sunday’s crash.

He keeps playing the video of the disaster, unable to believe what has happened, he says.

“When I saw the accident video, the plane seemed out of control,” said Jeon. “The pilots probably had no choice but to do it. My daughter, who is only in her mid-40s, ended up like this. This is unbelievable.”

Mi-sook was a warm-hearted child, he said. She brought some food and next year’s calendar to his house on 21 December, his last brief moment with her.

Authorities called out the names of some of those killed in the crash on Sunday, triggering an explosion of grief and rage among the passengers’ families gathered in the airport’s arrival area. They screamed, wept and collapsed on the floor of the terminal where their loved ones had been due to return home.

Crime scene investigators have collected saliva swaps from families to run DNA tests to identify the victims.

Jeon’s daughter had been on her way home after travelling with friends to Bangkok for the Christmas holiday. She leaves behind a devastated family, including a husband and teenage daughter.

“The water near the airport is not deep. Here are softer fields than this cement runway. Why couldn’t the pilot land there instead?” Jeon said.

Mi-sook was identified by her fingerprints, and her family is looking for a funeral home near her town of Gwangju to transport her body there.

“She was almost home, so [she saw] no need to call the family [to leave any final message]. She thought she was coming home,” Jeon said.

South Korea is reviewing plans to conduct a “special inspection” of all Boeing 737-800s in operation in the country, following Sunday’s crash, AFP has reported.

“101 B737-800 series aircraft are currently in operation in South Korea. Consequently, we are reviewing plans to conduct a special inspection on B737-800 aircraft,” said Joo Jong-wan, head of the aviation policy bureau at the South Korean transport ministry.

The Jeju Air jet pilot told air traffic control the aircraft had suffered a bird strike and declared mayday shortly before the plane crashed on Sunday, a transport ministry official said on Monday in a media briefing, according to Reuters.

More details to follow.

South Korea’s aviation safety record

As AFP reports, South Korea’s aviation industry has a solid safety record and the crash was the first fatal accident for Jeju Air.

On August 12, 2007, strong winds caused a Jeju Air-operated Bombardier Q400 carrying 74 passengers to veer off the runway at another southern airport, Busan-Gimhae. A dozen people were injured.

Before Sunday, the deadliest plane crash on South Korean soil took place on April 15, 2002, when an Air China Boeing 767 traveling from Beijing hit a hill near Busan-Gimhae, resulting in 129 deaths.

The most recent fatal crash of a South Korean airline happened in San Francisco, California on July 6, 2013. Asiana Airlines’ Boeing 777 aircraft missed its landing, leaving three dead and 182 hurt.

The deadliest disaster to hit a South Korean airline goes back to September 1, 1983, when a Soviet fighter jet shot down a Boeing 747, which Moscow claimed was mistaken for a spy plane.

All 23 crew and 246 passengers aboard the Korean Air flight - a New York-to-Seoul flight via Anchorage, Alaska - were killed.

I’ll hand the blog over to Rebecca Ratcliffe, who will continue taking you through our rolling coverage. Take care.