According to a partial transcript of communications with air traffic controllers acquired by the New York Times, the pilot of Jeju Air Flight 2216 signaled three different plans to land the plane that was attacked minutes before crashing in December, killing 179 people in December.
The transcript shows the pilot reported a bird strike and radiated a Mayday call when he approached South Korea’s Muang International Airport on the morning of December 29th. When that failed, the air traffic controller asked if he wanted to land from the opposite direction, and the pilot said yes.
The plane landed on the belly, covering the runway, attacking a concrete structure containing navigation AIDS, and exploded into a deadly fireball. Only two people survived, the Boeing 737-800 flight attendant behind the plane.
Causes of the disaster, the most deadly plane crash fall in Korea’s soil, is still under investigation and could be an important part of the puzzle. That’s because it covers the approximately four-minute period when both airplane flight recorders, known as black boxes, stopped recording.
The transcript does not contain information regarding the state of the two engines of the jet or its electricity supply. It is still unclear why the black box became darker and why the plane’s landing gear wasn’t involved.
The transcript was read to victims’ relatives on Saturday by representatives of the board set up to investigate crashes. People who shared with the Times told them that authorities had ruled out some of the conversation to protect participants’ privacy. Authorities have not made public the transcripts and the board did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Several investigations, including those by police, are underway in South Korea, including those in the solid concrete structure at the end of the runway, on what could have been the cause of the accident and what could have been fatal. Investigators from the US and France are helping with one of the investigations.
Much of what happened that December morning remains a mystery.
When the plane took off from Bangkok approached Muang in southwestern South Korea, it began its descent and reached an altitude of about 700 feet before hitting trouble.
The warning first occurred. Air traffic controllers told pilots to be cautious as there were birds in the area. About a minute later, both the plane’s black box (flight data recorder and cockpit audio recorder) stopped recording.
The suspension complicated the investigation. However, video shot by spectators, a preliminary accident report issued by South Korean authorities, and now transcription of the exchange with the pilot’s control tower, provides some clues.
This is what we know:
At about 8:58am, the pilot reported a bird attack on the tower and declared its intention to turn it around. “Mayday, Mayday,” one of the pilots said. “It’s spinning.”
Authorities later discovered the feathers and blood of migratory birds known as Baikaltir in both jet engines. The sighting video recorded a loud bang loudly from the plane’s right engine. This is described by aviation experts as a compressor stole or engine airflow disruption.
After the May Day Call, Control Tower told the pilot to climb 5,000 feet to “keep the runway headline.” The pilot agreed.
According to Hinok Chang, an assistant professor at the Department of Air Transport and Logistics at Hanseo University in Korea, this is the standard procedure when an aircraft cannot land. In such a procedure, the aircraft climbs to a safe altitude and waits in a holding pattern.
However, seconds after the pilots agreed to the plan, before the plane reached 5,000 feet, the Control Tower pushed them to state their intentions. They responded that they would turn left and land on Runway 1 (this is the term for approaching a single runway at the airport from the south; Runway 19 refers to approaching it from the north).
The pilot may have determined that “returning to the holding point and attempting a different approach to Runway 1 could cause further problems for the aircraft.” The compressor stoll observed in the video indicates that there was a problem with at least one jet engine.
Ten seconds later, the pilot reported that he could not land. They asked if they could turn right and head towards Runway 1, and the Tower gave them permission to do so.
The transcript does not explain why this attempt also failed. However, just after 9:01am, the air traffic controller asked if the pilot wanted to get closer to the runway from the north. “Want to land on Runway 19?” the controller asked.
The pilot said yes and the tower landed them.
Less than two minutes later, the plane crashed into the tarmac without deploying the landing gear. It slid across the edge of the runway, hitting a concrete structure, and exploded into flames.
It is not clear what the air traffic controller or pilot knew about the specific structure that housed what is known as the equipment landing system. International safety standards state that such structures are to be constructed to collapse on impact, but this was not the case.
Agnes Chang contributed to the report.
