• Two crew members survive, bird strike said to have caused disaster, both black boxes found
• Tearful relatives gather at airport terminal to await news; seven-day mourning announced
• Zardari, Shehbaz offer condolences

MUAN (South Korea): A Jeju Air plane carrying 181 people from Thailand to South Korea crashed on arrival on Sunday, smashing into a barrier and bursting into flames, killing everyone aboard except for two flight attendants plucked from the wreckage.

A bird strike was cited by authorities as the likely cause of the crash — the worst ever aviation disaster on South Korean soil — which flung passengers out of the plane and left it “almost completely destroyed”, according to fire officials.

Video showed the Jeju Air Boeing 737-800 landing on its belly at Muan International Airport, skidding off the runway as smoke streamed out from the engines, before crashing into a wall and exploding in flames.

“Of the 179 dead, 65 have been identified,” the country’s fire agency said, adding that DNA retrieval had begun.

Inside the airport terminal, tearful family members gathered to wait for news.

An official began calling out the names of the 65 victims who had been identified, with each name triggering fresh cries of grief from waiting relatives.

Only two people — both flight attendants — were rescued from the crash, the fire department said.

“Passengers were ejected from the aircraft after it collided with the wall, leaving little chance of survival,” an official told families at a briefing, according to a statement released by the fire brigade.

“The plane is almost completely destroyed,” he was quoted as saying.

Both black boxes — the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder — have been found, Deputy Transport Minister Joo Jong-wan said at a briefing.

Under floodlights, rescue workers used a giant yellow crane to lift the burned-out fuselage of the orange-and-white aircraft on the runway at Muan — some 288km southwest of Seoul.

Bits of plane seats and luggage were strewn across the field next to the runway, not far from the charred tail, offering a glimpse into the catastrophic impact of the crash.

The accident took place in a matter of minutes as Jeju Air Flight 2216 tried to land — with the control tower issuing a warning of a bird strike, and the pilot soon after calling “mayday”.

“It took approximately three minutes from the control tower’s mention of a bird strike warning to the aircraft’s attempt to land on the runway again,” an official said.

Video shows the plane coming off the tarmac and hitting a wall, but officials dismissed speculation that the length of the runway was a factor in the crash.

Lee Jeong-hyun, chief of Muan fire station, said the cause was “presumed to be a bird strike” but that the exact details would be announced after a full investigation.

Low-cost carrier Jeju Air said it “sincerely” apologised and vowed to do all it could to help. Boeing said in a statement that it was in touch with Jeju Air and stood “ready to support them”.

Seven-day mourning

South Korea’s acting President Choi Sang-mok, who only took office on Friday, convened an emergency cabinet meeting and then visited the crash site at Muan.

The country declared a seven-day national mourning period effective from Sunday, with memorial altars to be set up nationwide.

It is the first fatal accident in the history of Jeju Air, one of South Korea’s largest low-cost carriers, which was set up in 2005.

Condolences

President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in separate messages offered condolences.

The president expressed his grief over the loss of precious lives in the plane crash. He expressed his condolences to the people and the government of South Korea, said a release issued by the press wing of the President Secretariat.

Mr Zardari also expressed his sympathies with the bereaved families.

Prime Minister Shehbaz in a post on X said, “In this hour of grief, our thoughts and prayers are with the bereaved families and with the people and the Government of Republic of Korea”.

Published in Dawn, December 30th, 2024