A plane carrying 181 people suffered an accident when landing at Muan airport, in the southwest of South Korea, killing at least 85 people on Sunday, December 29, according to the latest update.
“So far, two survivors, 85 dead”said the firefighters in a press release. Among the victims, forty-six are women and thirty-nine are men. The plane was carrying 175 passengers and six crew members, the South Korean agency Yonhap announced. The authorities fear a much heavier toll.
“The cause of the accident is presumed to be a collision with birds combined with adverse weather conditions. However, the exact reason will be announced following a joint investigation”said Lee Jeong-hyun, head of the Muan fire station, during a press briefing.
According to Yonhap, the Jeju Air plane, which was arriving from Bangkok, landed on its belly shortly after 9 a.m. due to a possible malfunction in its landing gear. A video broadcast by South Korean media shows the aircraft – a Boeing 737-8AS put into service in 2009, according to the specialist site Flightradar – then colliding head-on with a concrete wall on the periphery of the installation, and be immediately engulfed in flames.
“Little chance of surviving”
Numerous emergency services vehicles and dozens of firefighters worked around the carcass of the plane, completely charred except for the tail, and evacuated bodies wrapped in blue shrouds on stretchers.
“The passengers were ejected from the plane when it collided with a barrier, leaving them with little chance of survival”said a local fire official during a meeting with the victims' families. “The plane is almost completely destroyed and the identification of the deceased is proving difficult”he added.
All passengers were South Korean, except for two people of Thai nationality. After the accident, domestic and international flights to and from Muan Airport, located nearly 290 kilometers from Seoul, were canceled.
Acting South Korean President Choi Sang-mok called an emergency government meeting and asked to use all available resources to save the passengers and crew.
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The incident comes as the country is plunged into a serious political crisis triggered by the unexpected attempted imposition of martial law by President Yoon Suk Yeol, who was subsequently impeached. South Korean lawmakers on Friday also impeached incumbent President Han Duck-soo and suspended him from office, leaving Deputy Prime Minister Choi Sang-mok to take over as president. of the State. According to Yonhap, the latter is on his way to the scene of the accident.
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“Jeju Air will do everything in its power to deal with this accident. We offer our sincere apologies”wrote the company in a press release published Sunday on its social networks.
Rare accidents in South Korea
This is the first fatal accident in the history of Jeju Air, one of the largest South Korean low-cost airlines, founded in 2005. On August 12, 2007, a Jeju Air Bombardier Q400 carrying 74 passengers went out of the runway in strong winds at Busan-Gimhae airport, in the south of the country, causing around ten minor injuries.
Plane crashes are very rare in South Korea. In May 2023, a passenger opened an emergency exit of an Asiana Airlines Airbus A321-200 about to land at Daegu Airport in the southeast of the country. The aircraft was able to land normally, but several people were hospitalized.
The most serious plane accident to take place in South Korea remains the crash on a hill near Busan-Gimhae Airport of an Air China Boeing 767 from Beijing, which killed 129 people. died April 15, 2002.
Before Sunday's accident, the latest fatal accident at a South Korean airline was that of an Asiana Boeing 777 which missed its landing at San Francisco airport in California, killing three people and injuring 182. , July 6, 2013. And the deadliest disaster for a South Korean company remains that of a Korean Air Boeing 747 connecting New York to Seoul via Anchorage (Alaska), which was shot down by a Soviet fighter over the Sea of Japan, causing the death of 246 passengers and twenty-three crew members on 1is September 1983.
