In South Korea, the crash of a Jeju Air plane left more than 150 dead when it landed in Muan

ASIA – The toll is very, very heavy. A Jeju Air plane carrying 181 people crashed and caught fire on Sunday, December 29 in southwest South Korea. Although there are a few survivors, most of the passengers (175 people) and crew members (six) have perished according to the latest information from the emergency services.

The plane (a Boeing 737-8AS which entered service in 2009, according to the specialist site Flightradar) crashed around 9 a.m. local time, a few hours after it took off from Bangkok in Thailand towards Muan, a town located about 290 kilometers south of the capital Seoul. It was the worst air disaster in South Korea’s history.

It is also the first fatal accident in the history of Jeju Air, one of the largest South Korean low-cost airlines, founded in 2005. “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.

What happened?

A video broadcast by local channel MBC shows the plane landing with smoke coming from the engines. The plane hit a wall at the end of the runway and was immediately engulfed in flames.

Images broadcast by South Korean television channels show numerous emergency service vehicles and dozens of firefighters working around the carcass of the plane, completely charred except for the tail, and evacuating on stretchers of bodies wrapped in blue shrouds.

How many victims are there?

“So far, two survivors – both crew members – have been found and 151 dead”the firefighters said in a press release. They had previously said that one of the two survivors was a passenger.

“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.

Acting South Korean President Choi Sang-mok chaired an emergency government meeting and is traveling to Muan on Sunday afternoon, his office said. “All agencies concerned (…) must mobilize all available resources to save people”he ordered in a press release.

What is the cause of the tragedy?

The first elements reported by the South Korean news agency Yonhap reported a “ landing gear malfunction ». The plane issued a distress message after a first landing attempt, during which the control tower warned the crew that the aircraft had been struck by birds.

“The cause of the accident is presumed to be a collision with birds combined with adverse weather conditions. However, the exact cause will be announced following an investigation”said Lee Jeong-hyun, head of the Muan Fire Station, at a press briefing.

Why do birds cause such drama?

Hitting birds in flight is the dread of pilots, especially when it comes to jet planes whose engines can quickly lose power or even stop completely after ingesting a bird.

In 2009, a US Airways Airbus A320 made a forced landing in the Hudson River, in New York, after the shutdown of its two reactors which had sucked in birds. The accident is known as “Miracle on the Hudson”all passengers and crew members having escaped alive.