South Korea to conduct Boeing inspections after deadly plane crash – The National
South Korea Officials said they will conduct all security checks on Monday Boeing It is difficult to determine which country’s airlines operate 737-800 aircraft which caused a plane crash the day before that killed 179 people.
On Sunday, the country’s worst aviation disaster in decades sparked a surge of national sympathy. Many are worried about how effectively the South Korean government will deal with the disaster amid the political turmoil caused by Yoon as it grapples with a leadership vacuum following the back-to-back impeachments of the country’s two top officials, President Yoon Suk-yeol and Prime Minister Han Duk-sun. the imposition of martial law at short notice earlier this month.
On Monday, new acting president Choi Sang-mok chaired a task force meeting on the crash and ordered authorities to conduct an urgent review of the country’s aircraft operating systems.
“The essence of a responsible response would be to update aviation security systems in general to prevent the recurrence of similar incidents and build a safer Republic of South Korea,” said Choi, who is also deputy prime minister and finance minister.
A Boeing 737-800 operated by South Korean budget airline Jeju Air aborted its first landing attempt for reasons that are not yet clear. Then, during the second landing attempt, the pilot received a bird strike warning from ground control before raising the distress signal. The aircraft touched down without deploying its front landing gear, skidded off the runway, crashed into a concrete fence and burst into a fireball.
Alan Price, a former Delta Air Lines chief pilot and now a consultant, said the Boeing 737-800 is a “proven aircraft” in a different class of aircraft than the Boeing 737 Max jet, which was linked to fatal crashes in 2018. and 2019.
Get daily National news
Get the day’s top news, political, economic and current affairs headlines delivered to your inbox once a day.
But South Korea’s transport ministry said Monday it plans to conduct safety inspections of all 101 Boeing 737-800 jets operated by the country’s airlines and a broader review of safety standards at Jeju Air, which operates 39 of those planes. Senior ministry official Joo Jong-wan said representatives from the US National Transportation Safety Board and Boeing were expected to arrive in South Korea on Monday to take part in the investigation.
Ministry officials also said they would investigate whether Muan airport’s localizer — a concrete fence housing a series of antennas designed to safely guide planes on landing — should be made of lighter materials that would break more easily on impact.
Joo said the ministry had identified similar concrete structures at other local airports, including those on Jeju Island and the southern cities of Yeosu and Pohang, as well as airports in the United States, Spain and South Africa.
Retired airline pilot John Cox said video of the crash shows the pilots did not deploy flaps or flaps to slow the plane, indicating a possible hydraulic failure, and did not manually lower the landing gear, indicating they did not have time. CEO of Safety Operating Systems in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Even so, the jet was under control and flying in a straight line, and damage and injuries would have been minimized had the obstacle not been so close to the runway, Cox said.
Other observers said the videos showed the plane suffering from suspected engine failure, but that a malfunctioning landing gear was the direct cause of the crash. They said the landing gear problem may not be related to the suspected engine problem.
Earlier on Monday, another Boeing 737-800 operated by Jeju Air returned to Seoul’s Gimpo International Airport after the pilot discovered a malfunction in the landing gear shortly after takeoff. Song Kyung-hoon, executive director of Jeju Air, said the problem was resolved by contacting the ground-based equipment center, but the pilot decided to return to Gimpo as a precaution.
Joo said officials are investigating whether there were communication problems between air traffic controllers and the pilot. “Our current understanding is that at some point in the round-trip process, prior to landing and impact, the connection became somewhat ineffective or lost,” he said.
Ministry officials said Monday that the plane’s flight data and cockpit voice recorders had been transferred to a research center at Gimpo airport before being analyzed. Ministry officials had previously said it would take months to complete the investigation into the accident.
The Muan crash is South Korea’s deadliest aviation disaster since the 1997 Korean Air crash in Guam, killing all 228 people on board.
The accident shocked and embarrassed many South Koreans, with the government declaring seven days of national mourning until January 4. Some have questioned whether the accident was related to safety or regulatory issues, such as the 2022 Halloween in Seoul that killed 160 people and the 2014 ferry sinking that killed 304.
Authorities have identified 146 bodies and are collecting DNA and fingerprint samples from another 33, the Transport Ministry said.
Park Han Shin, a representative of the families of the dead, said the bodies were so badly damaged that officials needed time to return them to their families.
“I request the government to mobilize more personnel to bring back our brothers and family members as soon as possible,” she said, choking back tears.
The crash was bigger news for South Koreans reeling from a political crisis triggered by Yoon’s martial law that brought hundreds of soldiers to the streets of Seoul and revived traumatic memories of the former military rule in the 1970s and 1980s.
The political turmoil resulted in the impeachment of Yoon and Han by the opposition-controlled National Assembly. The security minister resigned and the police chief was arrested for his role in imposing martial law.
The absence of senior officials responsible for disaster management has been a cause of concern.
“We are deeply concerned that the Central Disaster and Safety Response Headquarters is indeed unable to handle the disaster,” the mass-circulation newspaper JoongAng Ilbo said in an editorial on Monday.
© 2024 The Canadian Press
English