The sounds of sobbing, prayers and anguish echoed through the departures hall of an airport in southwestern South Korea on Monday as families of the victims killed when a passenger jet crash-landed over the weekend waited for their loved ones to be identified. <\/p>\n
All but two people on a Jeju Air plane carrying 175 passengers and six crew died after it crashed at the airport in Muan County just after 9 a.m. local time on Sunday \u2013 in what is the deadliest aviation disaster the country has seen in nearly 30 years. <\/p>\n
Loved ones inside Muan International Airport wept as medics announced the names of the victims who had been identified. So far, 146 victims have been identified, while efforts are underway to name the remaining 33 bodies, according to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. <\/p>\n
In the soaring atrium that normally serves as the airport\u2019s departure hall, scores of families huddled together, murmuring hushed prayers. Some were seen wrapped in each other\u2019s embrace, weeping, while several monks spoke to gathered groups. Rows of yellow tents stood erected for people who had stayed overnight. Several relatives could be seen yelling at officials, demanding more information. <\/p>\n
Investigators are working to pinpoint what may have caused the crash of Jeju Air flight 7C 2216, which was flying from Bangkok to Muan. South Korean officials confirmed on Monday that the pilot had reported a bird strike before he made the doomed emergency landing. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe pilot reported an emergency declaration and go-around due to a bird strike,\u201d said Kang Jung-hyun, a senior official at the transport ministry. The pilot said \u201cmayday, mayday, mayday\u201d three times and used the terms \u201cbird strike\u201d and \u201cgo-around,\u201d the official said. <\/p>\n
A \u201cgo-around\u201d is an aviation term that means a landing is aborted when a plane nears a final approach and instead the pilot will instead increase speed and ascend before attempting another approach or diverting elsewhere. <\/p>\n
Footage of Sunday\u2019s crash broadcast by multiple South Korean news outlets showed that neither the back nor front landing gear was visible. Video showed the plane, a Boeing 737-800, sliding on its belly at high speed, hitting an earthen embankment and erupting in a fireball. <\/p>\n
Two black boxes \u2013 the flight data and voice recorders \u2013 have been recovered from the crash site, according to a briefing by the transport ministry. But the flight recorder suffered external damage that required it to be sent to an analysis center in Seoul to see how much information could be extracted and whether it needed to be sent to the United States, the ministry said. <\/p>\n
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is leading a team of US investigators, including from Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration, to assist South Korean authorities. The NTSB said any information would be released by South Korea\u2019s Aviation and Railway Accident Investigation Board. <\/p>\n
South Korea\u2019s transport ministry said Monday that the control tower had warned the pilot about birds in the area shortly before the pilot reported a bird strike, made the mayday call and asked to land in the opposite direction. <\/p>\n
The ministry made the clarification after saying Sunday the control tower had instructed the pilot to change course shortly after he made the mayday call. <\/p>\n
The landing attempt occurred about two minutes after the mayday call, according to the ministry. <\/p>\n
Uncertainty remains as to what exactly went wrong, with some aviation experts questioning how much impact a bird strike could have had in bringing down the Jeju Air plane. <\/p>\n
The transport ministry said the head pilot on the flight had held the role since 2019 and had about 6,800 hours of flight experience. <\/p>\n
South Korea\u2019s acting president, Choi Sang-mok, has declared seven days of national mourning and ordered an investigation into the country\u2019s entire airline system. <\/p>\n
The transport ministry will inspect all Boeing 737-800 planes in the country, according to Deputy Transport Minister Joo Jong-wan. <\/p>\n
A total of 101 planes of the model used by six airlines are subject to the inspection with authorities looking at each jet\u2019s maintenance record on major parts, including the engine and landing gear, Joo said. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe will transparently disclose the progress of the investigation into the accident, even before the final results are released, and keep the bereaved families informed,\u201d Choi said Monday at a disaster control meeting in Seoul. <\/p>\n
A day earlier, Choi, also the country\u2019s finance minister, had arrived at the scene of the crash and declared it a special disaster zone as he expressed his \u201cheartfelt condolences\u201d to the families of the victims. <\/p>\n
The tragedy comes only two days after he assumed presidential duties following parliament\u2019s vote to impeach prime minister Han Duck-soo, who had been acting president since President Yoon Sul Yeol was impeached and suspended from power following his short-lived martial law decree earlier this month. <\/p>\n
Choi is leading the centralized disaster control team, a responsibility typically assumed by the prime minister. <\/p>\n
More than 700 personnel from the police, military, and coast guard have been mobilized for on-site response efforts, according to the transport ministry. <\/p>\n
Mourners have begun laying flowers and candles at a public memorial altar set up in Muan to honor victims of the crash, according to video by Reuters news agency. <\/p>\n
The victims of Sunday\u2019s crash include 84 males, 85 females, and 10 people whose gender could not be determined, according to the South Jeolla Fire Service. Both of the survivors were crew members, one man and one woman, according to the rescue team. <\/p>\n
Two Thai nationals were among those on board, according to the South Korean transport ministry. All the other passengers were South Korean. <\/p>\n
A father of one of the Thai victims, Boonchuay Duangmanee, told the Associated Press he \u201cnever thought that this would be the last time we would see each other forever.\u201d <\/p>\n
His daughter, Jongluk, had been working in a factory in South Korea for several years, he told the AP. She had been in Thailand visiting family before departing on the flight from Bangkok to Muan. <\/p>\n
\u201cI heard that the plane exploded in Korea this morning. But I did not expect at all that my daughter would be on this flight,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Another man who lost his daughter told Reuters he had not heard from her before the crash. <\/p>\n
\u201cShe was almost home so she didn\u2019t feel the need to make a call,\u201d 71-year-old Jeon Je-Young said of his daughter Jeon Mi-Sook. <\/p>\n
\u201cShe thought she was coming home. I figure in those last moments when she did try to reach out, the damage had already been done and the plane had probably crashed,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
This article has been updated. <\/em> <\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The sounds of sobbing, prayers and anguish echoed through the departures hall of an airport in southwestern South Korea on Monday as families of the victims killed when a passenger jet crash-landed over the weekend…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1985,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/invest360pro.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}