Jeju Air airplane crash raises questions on concrete wall on the finish of the runway

Aviation specialists are questioning the position of an airport design that positioned a mound of grime and a concrete wall previous the tip of a runway, which Jeju Air Flight 7C2216 slammed into Sunday morning, killing all however two of the 181 folks on board.

The airplane, a Boeing 737-800, belly-landed on the runway after an in a single day flight, apparently with flaps and touchdown gear retracted. The jetliner burst into flames after hitting the grime and wall, the place a localizer, which guides planes onto the runway, had been put in.

“Certainly that made it tough to cease the plane safely,” mentioned Todd Curtis, founding father of Air Safe Media, which tracks aviation accidents and different incidents. Curtis labored at Boeing for practically a decade as a security engineer.

It will take crash investigators months if not longer to uncover the reason for the crash, the worst-ever air catastrophe in South Korea and the deadliest crash in years. They will examine everything from plane upkeep data to pilot scheduling to cockpit voice recorders.

Initial proof suggests a hen strike may have performed a key position in attainable engine loss. Experts cautioned the investigation is within the very early phases.

Some aviation specialists say the fatalities may have been minimized had the airplane not collided with the concrete wall.

In video of the Jeju Air flight’s touchdown, “you see the airplane skidding alongside, it’s slowing down, they’re slowing down and all the things goes fairly properly up till the place they hit” the wall, mentioned John Cox, an aviation security advisor and a Boeing 737 pilot.

Cox mentioned he suspects the reason for loss of life for many of the passengers on board is “going to be blunt pressure trauma of hitting the wall.”

Barriers previous airport runways are widespread and beneficial.

At New York’s LaGuardia Airport and others, for instance, there are engineered materials arresting techniques, or EMAS, put in — a crushable materials that slows down a airplane past the runway and prevents it rolling into extra harmful areas. In 2016, then-vice presidential candidate Mike Pence’s airplane overran the runway at LaGuardia and was in the end stopped by EMAS.

The barrier on the fringe of the runway at Muan International Airport in South Korea didn’t look like frangible, or have the power to interrupt aside, in keeping with video footage and knowledgeable evaluation, one thing investigators are more likely to concentrate on.