A little over a week ago, we saw a horrifying accident, whereby a Jeju Air Boeing 737-800 crashed while landing at Muan International Airport (MWX), killing 179 people. It’s the deadliest aviation accident since 2018. With an investigation into the cause of the crash ongoing, it’s interesting to note that the country’s transport minister has announced his intention to step down…
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South Korea’s transport minister feels responsible for accident
Today (Tuesday, January 7, 2025), South Korea’s Transport Minister has announced that he intends to step down, to take responsibility for the deadly Jeju Air crash. During a press briefing, Park Sang-woo stated that he feels “heavy responsibility for this disaster.” He will try to find the right time to resign after addressing the current situation.
One might wonder why the transport minister would be taking responsibility for an accident in this way, especially since we don’t yet know for sure what caused the accident. It seems this accountability primarily centers around the embankment that the 737 hit, which contributed to the plane bursting into flames.
The localizer antenna (used for aircraft navigation) was a couple of hundred meters down the end of the runway, which isn’t unusual. However, what isn’t normal is how the localizer antenna had a concrete structure around it.
In the event of a runway overrun, it’s important for aircraft to have as much space to stop as possible, and there’s simply no denying that the concrete structure around the localizer contributed to the number of fatalities onboard the aircraft.
Joo Jong-wan, the deputy transport minister for civil aviation, stated that the safety measures when building the structure weren’t sufficient, though also said that this was done in line with regulations in both Korea and abroad. The police are even investigating how the embankment was constructed, and police have raided Jeju Air headquarters, as well as the headquarters of the company that runs the airport.
On the one hand, a resignation from the transport minister seems a bit premature, given that the investigation hasn’t even been completed. On the other hand, in places like Korea and Japan, optics and a sense of personal responsibility are important. It’s no different than how Japan Airlines’ CEO would take the bus to work several years back, when the airline was losing a lot of money.
The investigation into the cause of the crash continues
The investigation into the cause of the accident is continuing. While we know that the location of the concrete structure contributed to fatalities, we still don’t fully know why the pilots attempted to land the plane without trying to deploy the gear.
We know the plane had initially been given clearance to land on runway 1. Then the aircraft seemed to encounter a bird strike. So while the plane didn’t land in the direction intended, it ended up lining up to make an emergency landing in the other direction, on runway 19. That’s when the plane overran the runway, and ultimately burst into flames.
With the flight data recorder and cockpit voicer recorder having been recovered, we should soon learn more about what happened. As of now there are endless questions about why the pilots attempted to land the way they did, and I’m sure we’ll have some answers soon.
Bottom line
South Korea’s transport minister is resigning over the Jeju Air crash, claiming he feels “heavy responsibility for this disaster.” You’d never see a preemptive resignation like that in the United States, but it’s obviously just partly reflective of different cultures.
As of now, presumably the “responsibility” felt by the minister revolves around the concrete structure at the end of the runway, rather than anything related to the actual emergency landing, given the number of unknowns.
What do you make of South Korea’s transport minister resigning over the crash?
BTW Ben. That turbine traveller tweet is contradicting itself saying the localizer was 199m away and then subsequently saying the localizer was 251m away from the runways end Maybe want to have a closer look at tweets you choose to embed
This has everything to do with East Asian culture and little to do with the actual investigation / cause of the accident.
This is the correct answer.
Of course. The Asian way.
Convenient way to escape from that Presidential situation without losing face.
just because the public has not been told preliminary possible causes, investigators do know and it is very possible that, like alot of aviation accidents, this was a combination of multiple causes.
while the reasons for doing a belly landing need to be understood, there seems to be little debate that building a berm that was reinforced w/ concrete in order to support navigational equipment is not best practice, even though it is common worldwide....
just because the public has not been told preliminary possible causes, investigators do know and it is very possible that, like alot of aviation accidents, this was a combination of multiple causes.
while the reasons for doing a belly landing need to be understood, there seems to be little debate that building a berm that was reinforced w/ concrete in order to support navigational equipment is not best practice, even though it is common worldwide. the real question is how quickly as man of those berms as possible will be replaced regardless of the distance from the end of runways.
If there were crew training (which should be caught by regulators) or ATC issues that were not flagged, the ministry of transportation does bear some responsibility.