South Korea orders an air safety investigation after 179 people were killed in the country’s worst plane crash

South Korea’s acting President Choi Sang-mok on Monday ordered an emergency safety inspection of the country’s entire airline operating system, as investigators worked to identify victims and determine the cause of the country’s deadliest air disaster.

All 175 passengers and four six crew members were killed when a Jeju Air Boeing 737-800 plane touched down and skidded off the end of the runway at Muan International Airport on Sunday, exploding in a fireball when it struck a wall. Two crew members were recovered alive.

Choi said at a disaster management meeting in Seoul that the top priority now is to identify victims, support their families and treat survivors.

“Even before the final results come out, we ask officials to transparently disclose the incident investigation process and immediately inform the bereaved families,” he said.

“Once recovery from the accident is completed, the Department of Transportation is required to conduct an emergency safety inspection of the entire aircraft operating system to prevent recurrence of aircraft accidents.”

As a first step, the Ministry of Transport announced plans to conduct a special inspection of all 101 Boeing 737-800 aircraft operated by South Korean airlines starting Monday, focusing on the maintenance record of key components.

Jeju Airlines flight No. 7C2216, coming from the Thai capital, Bangkok, with 175 passengers and six crew members on board, was trying to land shortly after nine o’clock in the morning local time at the airport in the south of the country.

Fire and transportation officials said investigators were examining possible factors behind the crash, including bird strikes, whether any of the plane’s control systems were malfunctioning, and the pilots’ apparent rush to attempt a landing shortly after the emergency was declared.

Experts say many questions remain, including why the plane, powered by two CFM 56-7B26 engines, appeared to be traveling so fast, and why its landing gear did not appear to have dropped when it skidded down the runway and hit the wall.

CFM International is a joint venture between GE Aerospace and France’s Safran.

Transportation Ministry officials said Monday that when the pilots approached the plane, they informed air traffic control that the plane had been hit by a bird strike, shortly after the control tower warned them that birds had been spotted in the vicinity.

The pilots then issued a mayday warning and indicated their intention to abandon the landing, turn around, and try again. Shortly thereafter, the aircraft touched down on the runway in a belly landing, landing at an altitude of approximately 1,200 meters along the 2,800 meter runway, then sliding into the embankment at the end of the runway.

Officials are investigating the role the local antenna, located at the end of the runway to aid landing, played in the accident, including the concrete embankment on which it was standing, Transport Ministry officials said at a news conference.

“At an airport that has a runway at the end, usually, there is no wall,” said Christian Beckert, an aviation safety expert and Lufthansa pilot based in Munich.

“Maybe you have an engineering material blocking system, which allows the plane to sink into the ground a little bit and brake.”

The accident killed most of the local residents who were returning from vacation in Thailand, and two Thai citizens also died.

“I can only accept this and come to terms with it,” said Boonchoai Duangmani, 77, the father of one of the Thai victims. “When I think about it, I remind myself that it was just an accident. It’s something that could happen to anyone. So, I’ve come to terms with it because no matter what I do, my daughter will not come back.”

On Monday morning, investigators were trying to identify some of the remaining victims, while grief-stricken families waited inside the Moan Airport terminal.

Park Han-shin, who lost his brother in the accident, said authorities told him that his brother had been identified but he was unable to see his body.

Park called on the families of other victims to unite in the disaster response and recovery efforts, citing the sinking of a ferry in 2014 that killed more than 300 people. Many relatives of the victims of the Sewol ferry disaster complained that the authorities took a long time to determine the identity of the dead and the cause of the accident.

The flight data recorder was recovered

Emergency workers were examining the wreckage, which was almost completely destroyed when flames and debris engulfed the plane at the regional airport near the country’s jagged western coast.

Transport Ministry officials said the plane’s flight data recorder had been recovered but appeared to have suffered some external damage and it was not yet clear whether the data was intact enough to be analysed.

Jeju Air shares hit an all-time low on Monday, trading down as much as 15.7 percent. Boeing’s US-listed shares fell 4.2 percent in early trading, and are set to lose about $5 billion in market value.

Under global aviation rules, South Korea will lead a civil investigation into the accident and will automatically involve the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) in the United States, where the plane was designed and manufactured.

The NTSB said it is leading a team of US investigators to assist South Korea’s aviation authority. Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration are also participating.

Choe, who had been overseeing the recovery and investigation efforts, became acting commander just three days ago after the country’s president and prime minister were removed due to the imposition of short-lived martial law.