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3 Jan 2025 3:31
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  •   Home > News > International

    Here's what is known about South Korea's Jeju Air plane crash

    Investigations continue into what caused Jeju Air flight JC-2216 to crash and explode at the end of a runway at a South Korean airport.



    Investigations continue into what caused Jeju Air flight JC-2216 to crash and explode at the end of a runway at a South Korean airport.

    All but two of the 181 people on board were killed.

    South Korea has now entered seven days of national mourning to mark the tragedy, which is the deadliest aviation disaster the country has seen.

    Here's what we know.

    What happened to Jeju Air flight JC-2216?

    The plane, a twin-engine Boeing 737-800, approached Muan International Airport at 8:54am on Sunday, local time.

    At 8:58am, 1 minute after the airport's control tower issued a bird strike warning, the plane declared mayday, according to Yonhap news agency.

    It attempted to land on the runway going in the opposite direction.

    It did not extend its landing gear, meaning it was unable to slow down before it crashed into a fence.

    The plane appeared to approach the runway in a "controlled fashion", aviation expert and Luiss University Professor Gregory Alegi told Reuters.

    "If we just go back a few days to the terrible images from Kazakhstan instead, we'll remember that their plane was bouncing all over," he said.

    "Here, it's nice and straight and level.

    "So the pilots are clearly in control of the airplane, which again, begs the question, why did they not lower the flaps? Why did they not lower the landing gear?"

    Officials are now investigating whether a bird strike or poor weather could have contributed to the crash.

    Did a bird strike lead to the plane crash?

    Some experts have theorised a bird strike may have led to the landing gear malfunction.

    [tweet]

    Transport ministry officials have since confirmed the pilots told air traffic control the plane had suffered a bird strike, shortly after the control tower warned of birds in the area.

    A bird strike is a collision between a bird and an aircraft — if the bird collides with the windscreen or is ingested into an engine, it can cause an accident.

    Hanseo University Flight Education Center director Kim Kyu-wang told Yonhap: "If birds fly into the engine, it can damage the engine and affect the hydraulic system connected to it."

    However, US aviation industry consultant Scott Hamilton said it was too early to say if that was the case.

    "We don't know if [it was] one bird, two or three," he told ABC NewsRadio.

    "We don't know if it impacted one engine or both, so I am really hesitant to draw any definitive conclusions about the role of bird strikes had in this accident."

    According to Professor Alegi, "two scenarios" could have caused the crash after the initial fault.

    A direct impact could have damaged or jammed the landing gear.

    "It can also have impacted the engine, which also damaged the hydraulic power generation," he said.

    "Mind you, landing gear is fairly heavy in itself.

    "So it relies on hydraulic power to extend the landing gear. It could have impacted electrical wires, again, contributing to the difficulty in extending landing gear."

    South Korean and US officials investigate

    South Korea will now lead a civil investigation into the crash.

    Because the plane was designed and built in the United States, the US National Transportation Safety Board will automatically be involved.

    Both black boxes, including flight data and voice recordings, have already been recovered.

    Former Qantas captain Richard Champion de Crespigny said they would provide an audio trail for investigators to follow.

    "But at this stage, all we have is a lot of questions," he said.

    "I've been in the cockpit when things go wrong. There's lots of alarms. There's chaos, probable some fear response too, fight, flight or freeze.

    "We don't want these accidents to happen again, so we're going to learn from [this]."

    Mr de Crespigny was the pilot of Qantas Flight 32, which suffered an engine failure minutes after take-off on November 4, 2010.

    The plane made an emergency landing with no injuries at Changi Airport after managing to stay in the air for almost two hours.

    Mr de Crespigny said pilots used a system called "aviate, navigate, communicate" to manage in an emergency scenario.

    "Aviate means stay alive, just fly the aeroplane, keep it in the air," he said.

    "It appears they did just that, and they navigated to the other end of the airport … it's such a terrible consequence for something simple like a bird strike."

    US President Joe Biden said the US was prepared to offer any necessary assistance following the crash.

    One of the survivors, a 33-year-old flight attendant, was awake in hospital and able to communicate on Sunday night, according to Yonhap.

    The other survivor, a 25-year-old woman who was also a crew member, suffered injuries to her head and ankle.

    Authorities were considering whether to conduct a special inspection of all 101 Boeing 737-800 aircraft operated by South Korean airliners.

    They are also investigating whether the embankment at the end of the runway may have played a role in the crash.

    © 2025 ABC Australian Broadcasting Corporation. All rights reserved

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