The Jeju Air disaster in 2014 at Muan Airport was an avoidable tragedy according to the South Korean government. Investigators found that if no rigid concrete surface existed at the end of the runway, most or all passengers would have made it out alive.
Later investigations using computer simulation and technical analysis show that investigators arrived at a painful conclusion concerning this airline disaster. Had the runway been unobstructed or had it been constructed from materials that could be broken, then it is likely that the aircraft would have travelled forward before coming to rest. There would not have been an enormous explosion; there would not have been an enormous fireball; and the impact would have been far less of a catastrophe.
As it was, the aircraft crashed into a solid concrete barrier that was below what is considered to be the international safety standard for concrete, and this is where the incident became deadly.
According to the computer model developed from the crash, the aircraft would have travelled for several hundred metres in a gliding fashion before the aircraft would have come to rest on a flat surface. Thus, Had there not been a solid and unyielding concrete wall at the end of the runway, passengers would have been able to evacuate.
According to experts, there was no way that a wall or any type of structural barrier could have prevented the occurrence of a plane crash. A more flexible type of structure would have allowed for the impact to be limited to minor scratches, rather than resulting in a fireball. Unfortunately, this was not the situation at Muan Airport.
In late December 2024, a Jeju Air Boeing 737’s emergency landing at the airport in South Jeolla Province resulted in significant damage to the aircraft as a result of a bird strike, which caused serious mechanical issues and ultimately resulted in the downgrading of the landing gear’s functionality. As a result, the pilots were forced to execute an emergency belly land, which allowed the aircraft to slide along the runway until it collided with a concrete pier that supported the navigation equipment for the airport.
It was following this incident, moments after the aircraft caught fire, that only two of the 181 individuals who were aboard the aircraft survived. This crash has now become one of the most deadly aviation accidents in the last decade within South Korea.
Initially, investigators placed the blame on the bird strike and the pilot’s decisions; however, as investigators examined the facts of the incident, they found that the flight crew had to declare that they had shut down the engine as a means of reducing the amount of damage caused by the bird strike. The families of those killed in the incident feel that this statement misdirects blame for the failure of the crew to respond appropriately to the incident and shifts it back towards failure on the part of the airlines and/or regulatory bodies.
The families of the victims have confirmed what they have suspected all along with the release of the new research: This could have been avoided.
They have appreciated that the updated analysis points to what we refer to as “obvious human error,” especially with regard to design and safety planning at airports. They are now calling for an official apology, the complete availability of all evidence presented to the investigation, the introduction of legislation that would require independent investigations following air crashes, and a thorough investigation by Parliament on this issue.
For them, the concrete wall is more than just a wall—it is the physical representation of the preventable loss of life.
To date, airport authorities have declined to address any aspect of this publicly, claiming they will not make any comments on this until the final report of the investigation is released to the public. The fact that there are still no publicised findings has led to increased dissatisfaction with and distrust towards the airport authorities on the part of the victims’ families.
This case has begun a wider discussion about the safety of airports, the antiquated state of airport infrastructure, and the degree to which international regulations on airports are being fully adhered to. The scope of this conversation is no longer limited to a single landing; it has grown to include the question of how many similar risks to passenger safety still exist at or around airports.
Because if the simulations are correct, this catastrophe was not due to some divine intervention.
It was caused by a concrete structure where there should not have been one.
