On December 30, 2024, the wreckage of the Jeju Air plane that overran the runway and crashed was located at Muan Muan International Airport in South Korea.
Kim Hongzhi | Reuters
Aviation experts are questioning the role of the airport’s design, which places a pile of dirt and a concrete wall at the end of the runway. Jeju Air Flight 7C2216 hit the runway on Sunday morning, killing all but two of the 181 people on board.
airplane, one boeing company 737-800, belly landing on the runway after a night of flying, apparently with flaps and landing gear retracted. The jet burst into flames after hitting dirt and a wall that was equipped with locators to guide the plane onto the runway.
“It certainly makes it difficult to stop the plane safely,” said Todd Curtis, founder of Aviation Safety Media, which tracks aviation accidents and other incidents. Curtis worked as a safety engineer at Boeing for nearly a decade.
It will take months or more for crash investigators to determine the cause of the crash, South Korea’s worst ever air disaster and its worst in years. they will check everything From aircraft maintenance records to pilot dispatch to cockpit voice recorders.
Families of victims of the Jeju Air crash react as officials hold a briefing at Muan International Airport in South Korea on December 30, 2024.
Kim Soo Hyun | Reuters
Preliminary evidence suggests that bird strikes may have been a key cause of engine damage. Experts caution that the investigation is still in its early stages.
Some aviation experts said the death toll might have been minimized had the plane not collided with a concrete wall.
John Cox, an aviation safety consultant, said that in the video of the Jeju Air flight landing, “you can see the plane skidding, it’s slowing down, they’re slowing down, and everything was going fine until they hit on the wall”. and a Boeing 737 pilot.
Cox said he suspected the cause of death for most of the passengers on board was “traumatic trauma from blunt force impact against the wall.”
Obstacles passing through airport runways are common and are recommended.
For example, at New York’s LaGuardia Airport and other airports, engineered material interception systems (EMAS) – crushable materials that slow aircraft down off runways and prevent them from rolling into more dangerous areas – are installed. In 2016, then-vice presidential candidate Mike Pence’s plane overran the runway at LaGuardia Airport and was eventually intercepted by EMAS.
The barrier at the edge of the runway at South Korea’s Muan International Airport does not appear to be fragile or capable of breaking, which is a likely focus for investigators, according to video footage and expert analysis.
